ill 


THE  LIBRARY 

OF 

THE  UNIVERSITY 

OF  CALIFORNIA 

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FROM  THE  LIBRARY  OF 
ERNEST  CARROLL  MOORE 


THE   WORLD   WE    LIVE    IN 


rhe^)<^°- 


THE  MACMILLAN  COMPANY 

NEW  YORK    •    BOSTON   •    CHICAGO 
DALLAS   •    SAN    FRANCISCO 

MACMILLAN   &   CO.,  Limited 

LONDON   •    BOMBAY   •    CALCITTTA 
MELBOURNE 

THE  MACMILLAN  CO.  OF  CANADA,  Ltd. 

TORONTO 


THE 


WORLD  WE  LIVE  IN 


OR 


PHILOSOPHY   AND    LIFE    IN    THE 
LIGHT  OF   MODERN  THOUGHT 


BY 


GEORGE  STUART  FULLERTON 

PROFESSOR   OF   PHILOSOPHY   IN   COLUMBIA   UNIVERSITY 

NEW   YORK 


THE    MACMILLAN    COMPANY 

1912 

All  rights  reserved 


Copyright,  1912, 
By  the  MACMILLAN   COMPANY 


Set  up  and  electrotyped.     Published  June,  19". 


J.  8.  Gushing  Co.  —  Berwick  &  Smith  Co. 
Norwood,  Mass.,  U.S.A. 


1    V 


TO 

THE    HONORABLE 
JOHN    MARSHALL   GEST 

THIS    TOKEN 

OF    A 

LIFELONG    FRIENDSHIP 


1546125 


PREFACE 

It  is  a  fair  question  how  dry  a  man  has  a  right  to  be  when 
he  is  writing  upon  a  subject  which  ought  to  be  of  interest  to 
every  thoughtful  man.  The  world  in  which  we  find  ourselves 
is  the  common  property  of  the  learned  and  the  unlearned. 
The  problem  of  its  nature  and  of  our  own  adjustment  to  it 
stares  us  all  in  the  face,  if  we  think  at  all. 

Hence,  I  make  no  apology  for  having  written  in  a  very 
plain  and  straightforward  way.  A  truth  simply  stated  is 
none  the  less  a  truth.  An  error  stated  in  obscure  and  tech- 
nical language  is  given  a  breastplate  which  may  shield  an 
unworthy  life. 

I  hope  no  one  will  be  deterred  from  reading  my  book  by 
the  rather  formidable  collection  of  notes  appended  to  it. 
They  are  intended  chiefly  for  my  professional  colleagues, 
and  not  for  the  general  reader.  The  argument  of  the  book 
is  supposed  to  stand  upon  its  own  feet,  and  can  be  judged 
without  reference  to  them.  My  program  is  contained  in  the 
first  chapter.  He  to  whom  this  makes  no  appeal  need  not 
read  further,  for  my  problem  and  its  solution  will  not  interest 
him. 

That  I  am  wholly  in  the  right,  or  that  I  have  said  what  I 
have  meant  to  say  as  clearly  and  well  as  it  should  be  said, 
I  do  not  for  a  moment  suppose.  He  who  regards  himself  as 
infallible  in  philosophy,  or  who  speaks  with  authority,  stands 
revealed  as  lacking  in  a  sense  of  humor.  Did  I  suppose  it 
would  be  of  service,  I  should  indicate  the  chapters  which 
seem  to  me  most  in  need  of  emendation  by  some  one  more 
acute  ;  but  doubtless  the  critic  will  prefer  selecting  these  for 
himself. 

vii 


viii  Preface 

However,  the  work  is  intended,  in  part,  for  those  who  are 
not  first  of  all  critics,  but  who  read  with  the  desire  to  discover 
something,  even  if  it  be  inadequately  expressed,  that  may 
prove  helpful  to  them.  I  earnestly  hope  that  such  may  not 
go  away  empty-handed. 

The  man  who  stands  quite  alone  may  well  ask  himself 
whether  he  is  standing  just  where  he  should.  In  offering 
the  fruit  of  my  reflections  to  others,  I  am  encouraged  by  the 
thought  that  I  am  not  standing  alone,  but  that  what  has 
seemed  to  me  a  reasonable  attitude  toward  the  world  has 
seemed  reasonable  also  to  many  other  men,  both  learned 
and  unlearned,  who  are  not  devoid  of  judgment.  I  am  will- 
ing to  stand,  with  the  reservations  indicated  in  my  book,  as 
the  champion  of  Everybody's  World,  —  the  world  of  common 
experience  and  of  science,  —  maintaining  that  our  first  duty 
toward  it  is  to  accept  it,  and  our  second  to  try  to  understand 
it.  I  claim  without  hesitation  that  we  may  not  properly  be 
said  to  understand  it,  but  rather  to  do  it  violence,  if  we,  as 
philosophers,  feel  free  to  perform  such  operations  upon  it 
that  it  emerges  from  our  hands  robbed  of  its  familiar  and 
rather  unmistakable  features.  We  wrong  it,  if  we  dissolve  it 
in  the  acrid  vapors  of  a  general  skepticism ;  we  wrong  it,  if 
wc  thrust  it  out  of  sight  and  call  it  unknowable ;  we  wrong 
it,  if  we  evoke  a  magic  formula  and  substitute  a  shining  appa- 
rition for  homely  Mother  Earth. 

The  philosophic  reader  will  recognize  that  I  have  felt  it 
necessary  to  follow  a  path  which  leads  in  the  same  general 
direction  as  that  chosen  by  a  goodly  number  of  contemporary 
writers.  These  modern  realists  are  men  of  keen  mind  who 
appear  to  be  impressed  with  the  necessity  of  doing  full  justice 
to  our  experience  of  the  world  as  it  presents  itself  in  the 
actual  body  of  human  knowledge.  I  may  mention  the  names 
of  Woodbridge,  McGilvary,  Miller,  Holt,  Marvin,  Montague, 
Perry,  Pitkin,  Spaulding,  and  Kemp-Smith,  in  America;  of 
Stout,  Russell,  and  Moore,  in  Great  Britain ;  and  of  Kiilpe, 


Preface  ix 

in  Germany.  They  do  not  in  all  respects  agree  with  each 
other,  and  certainly  I  do  not  expect  them  to  approve  all  the 
opinions  which  I  express.  But  they  appear  to  me  to  be 
pressing  on,  each  as  he  best  can,  toward  the  same  goal.  If 
I  understand  them  aright,  it  is  that  which  I  have  set  before 
myself  —  the  working  out  of  a  sober  realism,  which  will  not 
refuse  to  accept  suggestions  from  the  idealist  where  such 
seem  helpful,  but  which  will  take  pains  not  to  be  misled 
into  doing  injustice  to  the  unmistakably  real  world  given  in 
experience. 

GEORGE   STUART   FULLERTON. 
Columbia  University, 
January,  191 2. 


CONTENTS 


CHAPTER  PACK 

I 


I.  Everybody's  World 

II.  The  Problem  of  Everybody's  World 

III.  The  World  as  Idea 

IV.  The  Unreality  of  the  World  as  Idea 

V.  The  World  as  Idea  and  the  Reluctant  Witness 

VI.  The  World  as  Phenomenon  .... 

VII.  The  Reality  of  the  World  as  Phenomenon     . 

VIII.  Our  World  and  Other  Worlds. 

IX.  The  World  of  the  New  Realism 

X.  The  World  Without  and  the  World  Within 

XI.  The  New  Realis.m  and  Everybody's  World 


XII.     The  V/orld  as  Mind-stuff  and  the  World  as  Will     167 


XIII.  A  World  of  the  New  Idealism  . 

XIV.  Another  World  of  the  New  Idealism 
XV.  The  Glory  of  It 

XVI.  Playing  with  the  World 

XVII.  The  World  of  Sober  Earnest    . 


16 

32 

45 
60 

72 
91 

99 
109 

129 

148 


183 
198 
215 
229 

253 


XVIII.    The  World  of  Knowledge  and  the  World  of  Belief    262 


XI 


THE  WORLD  WE  LIVE  IN 


CHAPTER  I 


everybody's  world 


I  SIT  down  at  this  desk  to  write,  betraying  in  the  very  act 
my  conviction  that  there  are  such  things  as  pen,  ink,  and  paper, 
a  desk,  a  room,  a  world  beyond  it  which  I  do  not  now  perceive, 
persons  in  it  who  will  read  my  reflections  and  understand  or 
misunderstand  them. 

I  know  well  that  if  I  sit  here  dreaming  and  do  not  write, 
I  shall  not  be  printed,  shall  not  be  read,  and  shall  neither  con- 
vince, nor  arouse  opposition.  I  have  said,  "sit  here  dreaming," 
and  the  words  mark  my  recognition  of  the  fact  that  before  me 
is  a  real  desk  in  a  real  room,  a  something  very  carefully  to  be 
distinguished  from  those  second-hand  existences,  those  eva- 
nescent imitations,  those  reflections  and  echoes,  that  people 
the  realms  of  dream  and  imagination. 

"I  shall  not  convince  any  one"  —  to  whom  do  these  words 
refer  ?  I  am  not  concerned  to  convince  the  men  in  my  dream  ; 
or  those  phantom  adversaries  whom  I  can,  by  a  free  play  of 
fancy,  call  into  an  unreal  being,  and  hold  them  there  long 
enough  to  secure  myself  the  idle  gratification  of  their  phantom 
discomfiture,  of  their  pretended  rout  and  confusion  in  the  face 
of  the  irresistible  thrust  of  my  argument.  These  men  are 
shadows  cast  by  my  hands,  my  creations,  puppets  on  my  own 
private  and  insignificant  stage.  If  I  persuade  them  of  the 
truth  of  my  utterances,  I  am  only  reassuring  myself;  if  I 
scatter  them  in  flight,  it  is  my  right  hand  overcoming  my  left, 
and  the  triumph  brings  with  it  small  cause  for  gratulation. 


2  The   World  We  Live  In 

I  am  concerned  to  convince  men  who  have  bodies  as  real 
as  this  desk,  this  chair,  this  room  hned  with  books,  men  who 
belong  to  the  same  world  with  these  things.  Men  who  could 
sit  down  here  and  write  —  who  may  now  be  writing  elsewhere 
—  who  are  quite  able  to  hold  their  own  against  me,  answering 
thrust  with  thrust,  and  surprising  me  by  the  skill  with  which 
they  parry.  Such  men  reveal  an  independence  little  flattering 
to  my  pride ;  they  may  give  me  suggestions  as  to  how  I  should 
hold  my  blade,  or  even  criticize  adversely  the  costume  in  which 
I  see  fit  to  walk  abroad,  indicating  that  I  might  have  learnt  to 
drape  myself  in  a  decent  obscurity  had  I  sat  longer  at  the  feet 
of  Hegel.  He  who  lays  aside  his  cloak  takes  the  risk  of  ex- 
hibiting before  the  world  evidences  of  poverty  which  the  self- 
respecting  prefer  to  keep  for  their  own  contemplation. 

These  my  real  neighbors,  my  friends  or  my  foes,  are  not 
fugitive  existences,  irresponsible  vagrants,  that  appear  for  a 
moment  and  then  vanish,  leaving  no  trace.  They  have  a 
domicile  and  are  to  be  accounted  for.  All  of  them  are  men  of 
ancient  lineage.  Their  ancestors,  unknown  to  me,  and  im- 
perfectly known  to  them,  have  from  time  immemorial  had 
their  place  in  the  material  world.  They  themselves  now  hold 
such  a  place.  Some  day  they  will  be  dissolved  into  their  ele- 
ments, which  elements  will  not  fade  into  the  nothingness 
which  awaits  such  stuff  as  dreams  are  made  of,  but  will  en- 
dure and  go  their  ceaseless  round  in  ever  new  combinations 
and  dissolutions. 

I  write,  then,  for  real  men  in  a  real  world.  It  is  permissible 
in  poetry  to  say  all  the  world's  a  stage ;  but  to  confound  the 
players  who  strut  and  fret  their  parts  upon  this  stage  with  the 
shadowy  personages  who  act  for  me  alone,  and  who  consent  to 
annihilation  when  I  begin  to  yawn,  is  not  permissible  in  prose. 
I  must  take  my  neighbor  more  seriously  than  this.  He  is 
independent,  disputatious,  not  in  the  least  inclined  to  admit 
that  I  am  the  Master  of  the  Show,  and  not  greatly  impressed 


Everybody  s   World  3 

with  my  philosophy.  I  must  at  him  again  !  And  I  must  take 
care  not  to  underrate  him. 

My  neighbor  is  a  man  of  sense,  and  is  not  to  be  treated  as  a 
heathen  and  a  pubhcan.  In  the  very  act  of  revolving  in  my 
mind  various  clever  assaults  upon  his  philosophical  faith,  I 
am  checked  by  the  reflection  that  we  have  much  in  common. 
We  long  ago  hit  upon  a  modus  vive7idi,  and  the  ordinary  com- 
merce of  life  has  been,  and  is,  carried  on  satisfactorily.  We 
live  in  the  same  town,  if  not  in  the  same  street.  We  speak 
the  same  language,  save  when  the  fine  frenzy  of  speculation 
betrays  us  into  utterances  out  of  the  common.  Our  actions 
seem  to  give  the  lie  to  those  verbal  extravagances  which  alarm 
the  timid,  but  which  do  not  really  portend  a  disastrous  out- 
break of  hostilities  and  the  severance  of  all  cordial  relations. 

All  of  which  means  that,  whatever  our  theories,  however 
original  and  startling,  however  fine-spun,  dazzling,  and  irides- 
cent, we  actually  find  ourselves  in  a  world,  and  pay  to  it  the 
substantial  tribute  of  involuntary  recognition.  It  is  the  world 
of  the  man  in  the  street,  it  is  true,  but  it  is  by  no  means  his 
peculiar  property.  From  it  the  scholar  must  set  out,  if  he 
will  discover  other  worlds  ;  to  it  he  must  come  back,  if  he  will 
persuade  any  one  that  he  has  really  discovered  anything. 

This  world,  the  world  of  common  experience  and  of  scientific 
knowledge,  is  the  very  ground  beneath  our  feet ;  we  cannot  so 
much  as  leave  it,  without  depending  upon  its  aid.  With  it  the 
philosopher  has  never  been  wholly  satisfied,  and  for  good 
reason.  It  is  imperfectly  illuminated ;  we  see  but  a  small 
part  of  it  from  any  given  point  upon  it ;  it  is  easy  to  miscon- 
ceive what  we  do  see,  and  we  are  brought  constantly  to  a  real- 
ization of  our  ignorance  and  error.  What  are  we  to  think  of 
the  world  as  a  whole  ?  What  should  be  our  attitude  towards 
it  ?  Some  men  never  raise  such  questions.  The  philosophers 
do ;  and  they  seem  to  them  among  the  most  important  ques- 
tions that  can  be  raised. 


4  The   World  We  Live  In 

But  there  are  philosophers  and  philosophers.  To  some, 
Everybody's  World  is  httle  better  than  the  City  of  Destruction, 
a  place  to  leave  in  haste.  Its  streets  and  byways  are  half 
forgotten,  its  laws  and  usages  allowed  to  slip  out  of  mind. 
When  such  men  come  back  to  Everybody's  World,  and  try  to 
hold  converse  with  their  fellows,  their  utterances  sound 
arbitrary  and  fantastic.  What  they  say  of  golden  streets 
leads  us  to  believe  they  have  been  dreaming  and  inspires 
curiosity  rather  than  respect.  Others  treat  our  common  home 
with  more  consideration.  They  are  miwilling  to  take  our  ac- 
count of  it,  which  they  find  more  or  less  inarticulate,  and  they 
claim  that  the  landscape  before  them  is  veiled  in  mist.  Every- 
body's World  is  not  to  them  precisely  the  world;  but  it  is  a 
view  of  the  world,  the  view  of  the  world  which  is  vouchsafed 
to  us  all  to  begin  with.  It  marks  the  direction  in  which  we  must 
look  with  straining  eyes,  if  we  will  attain  to  something  better. 
He  who  turns  his  back  upon  it  will  not  find  a  world  at  all.  If 
he  is  ingenious,  he  can  people  empty  space  with  ghosts,  but  he 
cannot  do  more. 

I  have  said  that  the  philosopher  is  not  wholly  satisfied 
with  Everybody's  World,  and  distrusts  our  accounts  of  it.  He 
may  well  complain,  not  merely  of  the  indefiniteness  and  incon- 
sistency of  our  utterances,  but  also  of  our  reticences.  There  is 
much  that  we  do  not  tell,  for  the  very  good  reason  that  there  is 
much  that  we  do  not  see  —  much  even  that  appears  to  the 
more  clear-sighted  to  be  spread  out  before  our  very  eyes. 
Like  Monsieur  Jourdain,  we  talk  prose  without  knowing  it. 
Nevertheless,  it  would  be  going  too  far  to  say  that  there  is  not  a 
very  general  consensus  of  opinion  as  to  the  broader  features 
presented  by  Everybody's  World.  He  who  would  have  us 
believe  that  they  are  delusive  appearances,  and  that  the  world, 
properly  so  called,  is  to  be  conceived  as  without  them,  totters 
under  a  burden  of  proof  of  quite  overwhelming  proportions. 
We  may  leave  him  for  the  present,  and  sketch  those  features 


Everybody's    World  5 

in  barest  outline.  The  sketch  will  be  recognized  as  true  to 
life,  I  think,  by  an  overwhelming  majority  of  those  who  have  so 
far  succeeded  in  dispensing  with  artificial  aids  to  vision. 

To  begin  with,  let  me  set  down  the  system  of  physical  things 
to  which  this  desk,  this  room,  my  body,  and  the  indefinite 
beyond  in  which  they  have  their  insignificant  place,  indubitably 
belong.  I  cannot  begin  elsewhere,  if  I  would.  At  no  time 
within  my  memory  has  any  feature  of  my  experience  been  more 
insistent  and  persistent.  This  system  of  things  we  admit  as 
common  property,  however  we  may  dispute  touching  the  mean- 
ing of  that  ambiguous  expression.  My  house  and  your  house 
are  in  the  same  street ;  you  can  visit  me,  look  at  my  books, 
handle  my  pen,  take  up  this  paper  and  shake  your  head  over  it. 
We  may  in  moments  of  irritation  deny  our  neighbor  a  mind ; 
but  to  deny  our  neighbor  a  body  is  to  deny  him  in  toto,  to 
snuff  him  out,  to  extrude  him  from  existence.  It  is  not  so 
much  as  an  exit  in  the  direction  of  the  fourth  dimension; 
it  is  not  an  exit  at  all ;  it  is  black  annihilation. 

In  the  second  place,  I  must  sketch  in  the  stage  puppets 
which  made  their  appearance  a  few  pages  back.  Everybody 
knows  that  he  imagines  things,  and  that  he  is  visited  by  dreams. 
But  he  is  perfectly  aware  of  the  fact  that  neither  the  gate  of 
horn  nor  the  gate  of  ivory  are  real  entrances  to  the  house  of 
Hfe.  They  give  admission  to  the  abode  of  shades.  In  a  given 
instance  a  man  may  not  feel  sure  whether  he  has  to  do  with  a 
shade  or  with  that  which  casts  a  shadow ;  but  when  the 
point  is  once  determined,  everybody  —  I  do  not  include  the 
idiots,  infants,  and  some  savages,  referred  to  by  Locke  —  every- 
body resolutely  condemns  the  shade  to  remain  in  its  own  place. 
There  can  be  no  doubt  that  men  generally  distinguish  with  a 
good  deal  of  sharpness  between  things  and  mere  imaginings. 

Nor  are  they  wholly  ignorant  of  the  distinction  between 
things  perceived  and  the  appearances  of  things.  Certainly 
they  make  use  of  the  distinction  every  day.     When  they  grow  a 


6  The   World  We  Live  In 

trifle  scientific  they  are  apt  to  call  the  appearances,  as  such, 
percepts,  and  they  say  that  some  percepts  give  more  satis- 
factory information  about  things  than  do  others.  The  fact 
itself,  however,  is  not  a  modern  discovery.  It  was  known  to 
prehistoric  man,  who  crawled  up  to  the  moving  figure  in  the 
distance  to  discover  whether  it  should  be  welcomed  as  a  friend 
or  attacked  as  an  enemy.  In  the  same  general  class  with 
things  dreamt,  things  imaginary,  and  the  percepts  of  things, 
belong  other  experiences  regarded  by  the  psychologist  as 
falling  within  his  special  province,  and  referred  by  the  man  who 
is  not  a  psychologist  somewhat  vaguely  to  his  "mind."  Thus, 
everybody  knows  that  sensations,  emotions,  and  volitions  are 
not  physical  things  and  must  be  excluded  from  the  realm  of 
such. 

To  return  to  the  physical  things.  In  Everybody's  World  it 
is  assumed  that  they  exist  continuously  and  go  through  various 
changes  independently  of  our  perception  of  them.  The  world 
was  here  before  we  came  into  it ;  it  will  roll  on  after  we  are 
gone.  We  do  not  stop  the  cosmic  clock  when  we  nod,  nor  does 
only  so  much  of  it  exist  and  function  as  falls  within  the  illu- 
minated circle  of  our  field  of  vision.  For  us,  things  appear  or 
disappear;  in  the  world,  they  exist  or  they  do  not  exist.  The 
distinction  is  clearly  marked  in  human  speech,  and  is  observed 
when  men  discourse  with  one  another.  Any  form  of  expression 
which  seems  to  slur  it  over  arouses  suspicion  and  antagonism  in 
the  natural  man,  nor  does  it  meet  with  a  hospitable  reception 
until  the  ground  is  prepared  for  it. 

And  the  physical  things  thus  given  an  independent  and  a 
continuous  existence  are  assumed  to  belong  to  the  one  world, 
to  form  some  sort  of  a  system.  Let  the  man  who  doubts  this 
try  to  persuade  his  simpler  neighbor  of  the  existence  of  a  planet 
at  no  distance  and  in  no  direction  from  any  other  planet,  of  the 
existence  of  a  man  who  has  at  no  time  been  anywhere.  Such  a 
man,  he  exclaims,  is  no  man ;  such  existence  is  nonexistence. 


Everybody  s    World  7 

Or,  if  you  please,  such  a  man  is  a  man  in  your  mind,  of  whom  you 
are  talking  incoherently.  A  real  man  must  be  an  historical 
character,  however  humble  the  part  he  plays  in  history.  A 
real  planet  must  have  its  appointed  path  in  a  space  continuous 
with  ours.  The  most  independent  of  the  unlearned  hesitate 
to  carry  their  pluralism  so  far  as  to  assign  to  a  thing  that  is  no 
thing  a  place  that  is  no  place,  and  to  apply  to  this  spectral  bit 
of  property  the  inappropriate  name  of  real  estate. 

We  should  not  allow  ourselves  to  be  seduced  by  an  ancient 
tradition  into  thinking  too  lightly  of  this  physical  system. 
In  Everybody's  World  it  fulfills  a  most  important  function  which 
some  have  overlooked.  It  has  been  said  that  mental  phe- 
nomena of  all  sorts  are,  by  men  generally,  excluded  from  the 
realm  of  physical  things.  I  may  add  that  mental  phenomena 
are  not,  by  men  generally,  accorded  a  continuous  and  independ- 
ent existence,  and  given  a  place  in  a  single  system  analogous 
to  the  material  system.  This  does  not  mean  that  they  are  sim- 
ply left  at  loose  ends,  treated  as  outlaws,  relegated  to  a  chaos 
beyond  the  confines  of  our  ordered  universe.  They  are  gath- 
ered up  and  put  into  minds,  which  minds  are  referred  to  bodies 
with  their  definite  place  in  the  system  of  things. 

In  their  account  of  these  minds,  and  in  their  suggestions 
as  to  the  nature  of  this  reference,  most  men  are  highly  unsatis- 
factory, if,  indeed,  they  have  anything  to  say  at  all.  This  is 
one  of  the  dark  places  in  Everybody's  World,  and  few  pretend 
to  see  clearly.  Nevertheless,  is  it  not  everywhere  accepted 
that  every  thought  must  be  thought  by  somebody,  that  every 
dream  must  be  somebody's  dream  ?  A  sensation  at  large  has 
no  more  right  to  exist  than  a  planet  at  large.  How  shall  we 
determine  whose  thought,  whose  dream,  whose  sensation? 
How  answer  the  insistent  questions :  When  ?  Where  ?  By 
turning  to  the  world  of  physical  things,  whose  "when's"  and 
whose  "  where' s"  are  spread  out  before  us.  It  gives  into  our 
hands  map  and  calendar. 


8  The   World  We  Live  In 

It  seems  scarcely  necessary  to  point  out  that,  having  dis- 
tinguished as  they  do  between  ideas  and  things,  and  having 
referred  certain  ideas  to  certain  bodies  existing  at  certain  times, 
men  generally  are  in  little  danger  of  confusing  their  ideas  of 
things  with  the  things,  unless  it  be  in  an  occasional  instance, 
and  through  some  blunder.  Caesar's  dream  of  a  triumphal 
entry  into  Rome  is  not  a  triumphal  entry  into  Rome.  My 
thought  of  Caesar  is  not  Csesar,  nor  is  my  thought  of  his 
dream  his  dream.  That  we  can  tliink  of  things  physical  and 
mental  is  accepted  without  question  in  Everybody's  World. 
Let  the  learned  decide  how  this  is  possible.  But  woe  be  to  the 
scholar,  be  he  learned  as  Rabelais,  who  would  persuade  us 
that  the  thoughts  of  things  are  not  different  from  the  things, 
and  that  to  the  things  must  be  assigned  the  same  place  in  the 
universe  that  we  have  assigned  to  the  thoughts !  This  is 
anarchy  !  This  brings  down  our  world  about  our  ears  in  a  mo- 
ment ;  the  fair  structure  crumbles  into  a  shapeless  ruin,  and 
the  dust  of  it  blinds  and  chokes  us. 

So  much  for  the  most  striking  features  of  the  world  which 
we  all  accept  to  begin  with ;  which  we  make  our  point  of  de- 
parture when  we  set  out  to  find  another.  It  has  been  shrewdly 
pointed  out  that  it  is  hardly  enough  of  a  world  to  be  called  a 
world  from  the  point  of  view  of  theory,^  though  it  is  a  very  good 
world  to  move  about  in.  Thus,  it  is  possible  for  a  man  to  object : 
"Physical  things?  Of  course  I  accept  them.  But  what  are 
physical  things?  In  what  sense  is  the  external  world  ex- 
ternal?" "Independent  of  me?  Of  course  the  things  I  see 
and  feel  are,  in  a  sense,  independent  of  me.  They  are  not  my 
dreams.  But  are  they  not,  after  all,  the  things  I  see  and  feel  ?^^ 
"Things  and  appearances  ?  Keep  the  distinction,  if  you  will — 
and  then  try  to  describe  to  me  things  apart  from  appearances." 
"Minds  referred  to  bodies?  You  have  indicated  that  things 
mental  are  of  so  peculiar  a  nature  that  they  cannot  be  looked 
for  in,  on,  under,  or  in  the  neighborhood  of  any  body.     Your 


Everybody  s    World  9 

'reference'  is  no  better  than  a  pillar  of  cloud  by  night.  You 
have  presented  us  with  a  word  hghted  up  by  no  ray  of  signifi- 
cance." 

In  other  words,  a  man  may  accept  and  object  in  the  same 
breath ;  accept  the  outline,  complain  that,  until  more  lines  are 
added,  the  character  of  the  figure  cannot  even  be  guessed. 
Nevertheless,  it  is  no  small  thing  to  have  even  an  outline,  a 
patch  of  common  ground,  a  spot  on  which  we  may  meet  and 
agree  to  separate.  And  it  should  never  be  forgotten  that  Every- 
body's World  is  really  enough  of  a  world  to  move  about  in,  to 
carry  on  the  ordinary  business  of  life  in.  It  is  quite  possible 
for  us  there  to  adjust  ourselves  to  the  present  and  to  make 
provision  against  the  future. 

This  means  that  it  has  a  constitution  with  which  it  is  wise 
for  us  to  acquaint  ourselves.  A  dawning  suspicion  of  this 
glimmers  in  the  mind  of  the  infant  that  decides  that  one  inser- 
tion of  the  finger  into  the  candle  flame  is  enough.  With 
advancing  years  it  is  impressed  upon  us  in  a  thousand  ways 
that  it  is  prudent  to  find  out  about  things  and  to  adapt  our- 
selves to  our  surroundings.  We  repeat  with  approbation  the 
aphorism  of  Bacon:  "Man,  the  servant  and  interpreter  of 
nature,  does  and  understands  as  much  as  his  observations  on 
the  order  of  nature,  either  with  regard  to  things  or  to  the  mind, 
permit  him,  and  he  neither  knows  nor  is  capable  of  more." 

It  is  matter  of  common  experience  that  the  world  is  a  very 
big  world,  and  that  we  are  a  very  little  part  of  it.  It  is  a  world 
in  which,  on  the  whole,  a  man  must  keep  his  eyes  open,  if  he  will 
not  come  to  grief.  To  be  sure,  some  are  so  situated  in  it  that 
they  may  close  their  eyes  to  much,  and,  nevertheless,  survive. 
All  ignorances  are  not  equally  fatal  to  all  persons.  And  there 
can  be  no  doubt  that  we  really  play  a  part,  that  we  have  some 
control.  Over  the  figures  on  my  own  private  stage,  over  my 
thoughts  and  imaginings,  I  seem  to  exercise,  if  not  an  absolute, 
at  least  a  powerful,  sway.     Over  other  things  I  cannot  exercise 


lO  The   World  We  Live  In 

the  same  authority,  but  I  am  not  without  some  influence.  I 
can  move  my  little  body  about,  and  can  cause  some  changes  in 
material  things.  Of  the  limitations  both  of  my  knowledge  and 
of  my  power  I  may  remain  ignorant  as  long  as  I  am  not  put 
to  the  test.  Where,  in  the  ordinary  course  of  nature,  the  test 
is  a  thing  to  be  expected,  and  is  palpable  and  undeniable, 
men  learn  to  conduct  themselves  with  modesty  and  to  speak 
with  caution. 

The  recognition  of  our  somewhat  humble  place  in  the  system 
of  things  may  fairly  be  included  among  the  features  of  Every- 
body's World.  Men  do  not  attempt  to  control  the  stars  in  their 
courses,  or  to  call  spirits  from  the  vasty  deep,  being  well  aware 
that  the  attempt  would  be  futile.  It  is  everybody's  secret 
that  the  little  sphere  of  the  known  is  bounded  by  the  limitless 
unknown.  And  both  in  common  life  and  in  the  sciences  there 
is  a  restless  activity,  the  aim  of  which  is  to  increase  our  knowl- 
edge and  to  add  to  our  power. 

I  expressly  include  the  sciences  because  the  man  of  science 
lives  in  the  same  world  with  the  rest  of  us.  We  should  have 
the  grace  to  see  in  him  an  honored  inhabitant  of  that  world,  and 
we  should  Hsten  to  his  utterances  with  respect.  But  if  we 
have  clear  vision,  it  must  be  plain  to  us  that,  whether  he  is 
giving  us  an  account  of  the  past  history  of  our  solar  system, 
is  predicting  the  return  of  a  comet,  is  indicating  the  presence 
in  space  of  planets  not  as  yet  revealed  to  any  human  eye,  or  is 
setting  up  a  theory  touching  the  imperceptible  constituents 
of  the  bodies  which  surround  us,  he  is,  nevertheless,  describing 
our  world,  or  guessing  at  its  contents.  It  is  always  possible 
for  him  to  do  his  work  without  raising  the  special  questions 
which  have  been  dwelt  upon  above.  When  he  has  done  it, 
we  may  treat  the  things  of  which  he  speaks  as  we  have  treated 
the  objects  that  knock  every  day  at  our  doors.  Planet,  or 
atom,  or  electron  —  is  the  thing  real  and  physical  ?  What  does 
it  mean  to  be  a  physical  thing  ?   Is  the  thing  in  space,  and  re- 


Everybody  s   World  1 1 

lated  to  other  objects  in  space  ?  How  does  the  object  differ 
from  my  idea  of  it?  Such  questions  the  man  who  gives  us 
information  about  the  thing  is  bound  neither  to  ask  nor  to 
answer.  His  world  is  Everybody's  World;  he  should  know 
it  well,  but  it  is  not  his  duty  to  leave  it  and  to  seek  another. 

That  it  is  a  matter  of  practical  importance  to  us  all  to  increase 
our  information  is  a  commonplace.  If  we  are  to  get  what  we 
want,  we  must  be  able  to  see  what  we  want.  Time  spent  in 
extolling  the  merits  of  science  is,  in  our  day,  time  lost.  As  well 
enter  upon  an  argument  to  prove  to  men  that  we  cannot 
orient  ourselves  satisfactorily  so  long  as  the  shades  of  night 
envelop  us,  and  that  we  walk  most  securely  by  daylight. 
Nevertheless,  it  is  a  good  thing  to  bear  in  mind  what  the 
sciences  do  for  us  and  what  they  do  not  do.  They  give  us  a 
fuller  and  better  revelation  of  the  world  of  our  common  expe- 
rience, informing  us  as  to  what  has  been,  showing  us  what  is, 
and  giving  us  hints  as  to  what  we  are  to  expect  under  given 
circumstances.  But  science,  unless  it  passes  over  to  something 
which  men  have  usually  called  by  another  name,  does  not  exhibit 
the  world  under  a  different  light  from  that  to  which  we  are 
accustomed ;  and  to  the  reflective  this  light  has  always  seemed 
in  certain  respects  an  insufficient  illumination. 

There  are  those  who  are  inspired  by  a  lively  curiosity  to  see 
the  world  otherwise  than  through  the  eyes  of  the  average  man, 
even  the  average  man  of  broad  information.  What  the  latter 
takes  for  granted  strikes  them  as  problematic ;  what  he  jolts 
over  with  indifference,  scarcely  feeling  the  shock,  impresses 
them  as  intolerable  inconsistency.  Must  one,  they  protest, 
ever  remain  on  the  surface  of  things  ?  Are  we  to  be  such 
spectators  as  sit,  open-eyed  and  attentive,  to  be  sure,  watching 
the  shifting  scenes  which  succeed  one  another  and  recording 
the  lines  pronounced  by  the  actors,  but  never  asking  themselves 
whether  the  play  is  comedy,  tragedy,  or  melodrama,  is  consistent 
in  its  several  parts,  is  well  put  together,  has  a  moral  purpose 


12  The   World  We  Live  In 

or  is  intended  only  to  amuse  ?  Nor  is  an  intellectual  curiosity 
the  only  spur  to  reflection  upon  the  world  and  its  meaning. 
Men  burn  to  attain  to  some  sort  of  a  world-vision  —  to  see 
themselves  and  the  system  of  things  in  perspective.  They  feel 
that,  could  they  attain  to  this,  it  might  introduce  into  life  a 
consistency  and  harmony  lacking  in  the  hand-to-mouth  exist- 
ence of  the  man  of  limited  horizon  and  of  many  maxims. 
What  is  wanted  is  such  a  view  of  the  world  as  may  make  pos- 
sible an  attitude  towards  it,  as  may  suggest  a  rule  of  life.  To 
many,  some  such  view  is  an  imperious  emotional  need. 

But  must  we  not  admit  that  even  those  who  think  little  and 
read  less,  the  unreflective  many,  have  some  sort  of  an  outlook 
upon  the  world  and  an  attitude  towards  it  ?  There  is  such  a 
thing  as  a  philosophy  which  is  the  passive  precipitate  of  tradi- 
tion, temperament,  and  past  experience  of  life.  Those  who 
accept  it  are  little  troubled  by  problems ;  obscurity  and  confu- 
sion are  familiar  elements  in  their  universe,  and  are  taken  as  a 
matter  of  course ;  an  occasional  self-contradiction  causes  no 
acute  discomfort.  They  can  make  up  their  minds  about  the 
world  and  their  own  place  in  it,  without  raising  difficult  questions 
and  trying  to  answer  them.  No  problem  can  plague  us,  if  we 
will  only  put  it  out  of  our  minds  and  refuse  to  think  about  it. 

Manifestly,  such  a  philosophy  will  not  satisfy  the  reflective. 
It  is  the  philosophy  of  the  man  who  sees  nothing  to  complain  of 
in  Everybody's  World ;  it  is  an  instinctive  reaction  to  environ- 
ment. The  more  thoughtful  must  have  something  else,  and 
for  help  in  their  need  they  naturally  turn  to  those  apostles  of 
reflection,  the  philosophers.  These  men,  in  their  pursuit  of 
knowledge,  are  not  supposed  to  neglect  wisdom.  They  take 
large  views  of  things.  To  whom  else  shall  we  go,  if  we  wish  to 
see  united  into  a  harmonious  whole  the  broken  and  scattered  bits 
of  our  experience  ?  Who  else  can  light  up  for  us  the  dark  places 
of  the  world  of  common  knowledge  and  reveal  to  us  the  world? 

I  have  been  careful  to  say  above  "the  philosophers,"  not 


Everybody's  World  13 


«5 


"philosophy."  The  former  are  numerous  and  much  in  evi- 
dence ;  the  latter  —  if  by  philosophy  we  mean  the  true  and  au- 
thoritative philosophy  —  is  more  difficult  to  identify,  and  he 
who  seeks  it  must  grow  accustomed  to  hearing  "lo,  here  ! "  and 
"lo,  there  !"  uttered,  sometimes  intones  of  hesitating  uncer- 
tainty, sometimes  with  unblushing  and  blatant  assurance.  But 
to  the  philosophers  we  can  turn,  and  we  may  ask  them :  "How 
should  we  think  of  the  world  ?  and  what  is  its  significance  for 
us?"  It  is  something  to  have  friends  and  advisers,  even  if 
they  be  men  like  ourselves,  with  no  pretentions  to  infallibihty. 

The  perplexing  thing  is  that  there  is  such  a  bewildering  va- 
riety of  philosophers.  We  have  a  world  to  begin  with ;  one 
not  wholly  satisfactory,  but,  on  the  other  hand,  not  wholly  bad. 
There  is  a  body  of  knowledge  which  we  accept  and  must  accept. 
This  we  look  to  the  philosopher  to  render  clearer,  more  con- 
sistent, more  significant.  But  we  do  not  go  to  him  to  have  him 
rob  us  of  our  world  altogether,  or  to  perform  upon  it  such  opera- 
tions that  it  is  no  longer  recognizable  as  a  world.  And  some 
philosophers  do  appear  to  attack  the  problem  of  the  world  with 
an  incontinent  energy  that  impresses  the  sober  man  as  promis- 
ing notliing  less  than  demolition ;  while  others  wave  the  magic 
wand  of  transformation,  and,  in  exchange  for  homely  and 
famihar  Mother  Earth,  present  us  with  a  whole  galaxy  of 
shining  luminaries,  which  we  accept  doubtfully,  uncertain  that 
the  donor  has  the  right  to  bestow  what  we  never  suspected  him 
of  having  in  his  possession. 

Thus,  there  have  been  those  who  have  been  so  impressed 
with  the  difficulties  in  the  way  of  giving  a  satisfactory  account 
of  the  world,  that  they  have  decided  to  get  along  without  a 
world.  They  have  counseled  a  skepticism  that  leaves  the  mind 
empty  and  the  will  palsied.  There  are  those  who  have  thrust 
the  real  world  out  of  sight,  and  have  fed  mankind  upon  a  diet  of 
copies  and  images.  There  are  those  who  have  made  of  the  world 
an  unreal  appearance  which  rather  conceals  than  reveals  the 


14  The   World  We  Live  In 

reality  which  it  is  not  supposed  to  resemble,  the  reality  whose 
muffled  footfalls  we  can  faintly  hear,  but  whose  form  cannot 
even  be  guessed,  as  it  lurks  forever  in  the  shade. 

Others  have  announced  discoveries  of  a  more  cheerful  nature, 
but  which  seem  as  startling  to  the  common  understanding  of 
man  as  they  are  flattering  to  his  vanity.  Have  we  not  been 
told  that  the  real  things  about  us,  the  whole  broad  world  of 
which  we  feel  ourselves  to  be  such  an  insignificant  part,  may  be 
regarded  as  our  idea  ?  The  new  sense  of  proprietorship  may 
well  overcome  the  sentiment  of  shrinking  modesty  with  which 
most  men  reflect  upon  the  contrast  between  their  little  selves 
and  the  universe  in  which  they  have  heretofore  thought  they 
lived.  Some  authorities  inform  us  that  we  create  our  world, 
and  indicate  that  much  comfort  is  to  be  derived  from  that 
thought.  Those  who  go  so  far  as  to  tell  us  that  we  can,  within 
certain  broad  limits,  make  it  what  we  please,  encourage  us  to 
embrace  an  optimism  in  comparison  with  which  that  of  Candida 
becomes  a  vanishing  quantity. 

The  philosophers  speak,  thus,  a  varied  language.  Where 
shall  we  look  to  find  a  check  upon  their  utterances  ?  Shall  we  in- 
cline to  follow  those  who  consign  us  to  bottomless  ignorance  and 
dark  despair,  those  who  cheer  us  with  roseate  dreams,  or  those 
who  Vv^alk  soberly  and  say  little  that  is  starthng  ?  If  we  are  wise, 
we  shall  listen  to  every  suggestion,  be  thankful  for  every  hint. 
Left  quite  to  our  own  devices  we  are  comparatively  helpless,  for 
no  human  being,  however  fertile  his  genius,  could  begin  to  im- 
agine all  the  solutions  of  the  world-problem  which  have  been  be- 
gotten of  the  collective  ingenuity  of  mankind.  But  adopt  every 
suggestion  we  cannot ;  they  are  too  many  and  too  diverse.  We 
must  choose  between  them.     On  what  principle  shall  we  choose  ? 

I  suggest,  as  a  tentative  principle,  that,  in  taking  the  measure 
of  new  worlds,  it  is  not  wise  to  let  the  old  world,  in  which  we 
have  all  lived,  slip  quite  out  of  view.  That  it  is  not  a  very 
good  world  for  all  purposes,  I  have  frankly  admitted.     It  is, 


Everybody  s  World  1 5 

however,  at  least  a  world,  and  the  others  have  yet  to  prove  their 
right  to  the  title.  ]My  suggestion  is  not  gratuitous  and  super- 
fluous, as  will,  I  hope,  be  made  plain  in  the  chapters  to  follow. 
It  is  possible  for  a  philosopher,  in  his  eager  pursuit  of  new 
truth,  to  lose  sight  of  this  or  that  rather  undeniable  feature  of 
the  world  of  common  knowledge.  He  who  thus  gives  the  rein 
to  his  invention  offers  us,  in  place  of  what  seems  to  be  palpable, 
if  imperfectly  apprehended,  truth,  what  does  not  easily  differ- 
entiate itself  from  romance. 

One  objection  to  my  suggestion  will,  I  am  sure,  at  once  arise 
in  the  minds  of  some  persons.  To  sweep  and  to  garnish  the 
house  one  lives  in  is  a  commonplace  business ;  to  enter  the 
enchanted  palace  is  to  thrill  with  emotion.  How  can  one  take 
those  exciting  aerial  fhghts  in  the  company  of  the  philosopher, 
if  one  is  perpetually  to  be  feeling  for  the  ground  with  one's 
foot  ?  The  headlong  plunge  through  eddying  gulfs  of  air  has  a 
fascination  which  some  are  not  willing  to  deny  themselves. 
Such  will  complain :  If  you  really  have  no  intention  of  reveal- 
ing to  us  a  new  heaven  and  a  new  earth,  why  write  ?  What  have 
you  to  say  that  can  interest  us  ? 

To  this  I  answer :  Tastes  differ.  There  are  men  who  eagerly 
desire  to  see  clearly,  to  come  to  a  better  understanding  of  the 
world  and  of  their  own  position  in  it,  but  who  have  no  little 
fear  of  becoming  the  victims  of  illusion.  Such  men  are  pos- 
sessed of  the  conservative  instinct  that  leads  them  to  distrust 
prophetic  utterances,  acute  surprises,  sudden  transformations, 
detonations,  and  showers  of  colored  stars.  They  regard  the 
world  of  our  common  experience  as  ground  on  which  even  the 
philosopher  should  build  —  of  course,  after  sounding  it  and 
making  sure  of  his  foundation.  They  ask  him  to  light  his 
lamp,  not  to  rub  it.  Such  men  will  not  be  offended  at  my  sug- 
gestion that,  in  our  voyages  of  discovery,  it  may  be  prudent  to 
keep  in  mind  the  distance  and  direction  of  the  place  from  which 
we  started,  and  to  which  we  hope  some  day  to  return. 


CHAPTER  II 

THE   PROBLEM   OF   EVERYBODY'S    WORLD 

We  have  seen  in  the  last  chapter  that  one  of  the  most 
striking  features  of  our  world  is  a  system  of  physical  things  inde- 
pendent, in  some  sense,  of  our  percepts  and  ideas,  but  not  unre- 
lated to  them.  This  physical  system  seems  to  be  the  very 
backbone  of  the  universe  presented  in  our  experience.  If  we 
refuse  to  acknowledge  it,  what  significance  remains  to  our  words 
when  we  say:  My  present  percept  of  this  desk?  Your  mem- 
ory of  the  same  bit  of  furniture  ?  The  honor  of  the  man  who 
died  o'  Wednesday?  Nebuchadnezzar's  dream?  Abstract 
space  and  time  are  checks,  not  specie.  Unless  there  be  spaces 
and  times  —  places  and  dates  of  things  and  their  changes  — 
those  checks  are  so  much  waste  paper. 

We  have  all  been  at  some  time  ignorant  of  the  world-order; 
we  have  grown  up,  and  we  find  ourselves  in  an  orderly  world. 
How  have  we  discovered  that  physical  system  of  things  which 
relegates  even  dreams  and  fancies  to  their  proper  place  and 
makes  it  possible  to  identify  them  as  dreams  and  fancies? 
How  does  each  of  us  recognize  it  now,  in  the  midst  of  the  be- 
wildering variety  of  experiences  that  come  to  him,  many  of 
which  experiences  he  sets  aside  as  not  physical,  but  mental  ? 

I  speak  of  the  desk  in  my  room,  of  the  apple  that  happens 
to  be  lying  upon  it,  of  the  clanging  bell  in  the  street.  If  asked 
to  do  so,  I  do  not  hesitate  to  describe  the  things  of  which  I 
speak.  This  should  indicate  that  I  know  something  about  them. 
In  Everybody's  World  it  is  assumed  that  I  do  know  something 
about  them,  and  am  not  talking  at  random.  How  do  I  know  ? 
I  can  see,  touch,  hear,  smell,  and  taste.     The  things  present 

i6 


The  Problem  of  Everybody  s  World  17 

themselves  either  directly,  or  through  certain  proxies.  Thus, 
I  can  describe  the  desk  because  I  see  and  touch  it ;  I  can  infer 
what  sort  of  a  bell  is  distracting  the  street  because  I  hear  the 
strident  sounds. 

But  the  simpHcity  of  this  explanation  is  too  great  to  make  it 
satisfactory  to  one  who  is  capable  of  the  least  reflection.  The 
desk  and  the  apple  do  present  themselves,  it  is  true ;  they  ap- 
pear in  my  experience.  But  they  appear  under  such  varying 
guises  that  it  implies  quite  an  education  on  my  part  to  recognize 
that  I  am  in  each  case  concerned  with  my  desk  and  my  apple. 
Like  every  one  else,  I  early  made  the  discovery  that  I  cannot 
perceive  things  except  through  my  sense  organs,  and  it  is  very 
evident  that  a  thing  tricks  itself  out  in  a  different  costume  for 
presentation  at  the  court  of  each  sense.  Things  do  not  feel 
colored,  smell  hard,  or  taste  sonorous.  Moreover,  they  keep 
changing  their  clothes  as  they  approach  the  throne  —  a  desk 
seen  at  a  distance  and  a  desk  seen  close  at  hand  may  be  the 
same  desk,  but  it  must  be  confessed  that  they  do  not  look  the 
same ;  the  clangor  of  the  bell  may  be  deafening,  but  it  is  so  to 
the  man  in  the  belfry,  not  to  me,  here  in  my  study  and  behind 
closed  windows. 

In  the  absence  of  all  experiences  of  a  thing,  I  certainly  do 
not  get  the  thing  at  all  —  I  perceive  nothing.  On  the  other 
hand,  we  say  that  things  present  themselves,  we  speak  of  our- 
selves as  perceiving  them,  when  we  have,  now  one  experience, 
now  another,  now  a  third ;  indeed,  when  we  have  any  one  of  an 
indefinite  number  of  experiences  each  of  which  differs  from 
each  other,  and  some  of  which  seem  so  different  from  some  oth- 
ers that  they  scarcely  appear  to  have  a  common  measure.  He 
who  reflects  upon  these  facts  cannot  avoid  making  some  dis- 
tinction between  a  thing  and  its  appearances.  He  begins  to 
ask  himself  anxiously :  Does  the  thing  really  present  itself  ? 
and  if  so,  in  what  sense  ?  Stripped  of  appearances,  the  thing 
eludes  us  altogether;   it  is  not  distinguishable  from  nothing. 


iS  The   World  We  Live  In 

On  the  other  hand,  what  appearance  maybe  accepted  as  giving  us 
the  thing  ?  Is  not  every  appearance  rather  the  cloak  than  the 
man,  and  does  not  the  man  change  his  cloak  to  suit  all  weath- 
ers ?  These  questions  do  not  become  the  less  insistent  as  we 
increase  our  scientific  knowledge ;  they  call  the  more  loudly 
for  an  answer.  He  who  tells  me  that  the  pen  between  my 
fingers  consists  of  groups  of  atoms,  and  the  atoms,  perhaps,  of 
something  even  more  elusive  and  difficult  to  apprehend,  does 
not  allay  my  discontent  with  the  simple  and  apparently  truth- 
ful statement  that  things  present  themselves.  I  am  impelled 
to  torment  myself  with  the  query:  What  is  really  out  there,  exist- 
ing and  functioning  ?     What  is  it  like? 

Very  early  in  the  history  of  speculative  thought  men  began 
to  plague  themselves  with  such  reflections.  Their  material 
lay  immediately  before  their  eyes,  and  they  could  not  overlook 
it.  The  plainest  of  plain  men  knows  that  some  appearances  are 
unsatisfactory.  If  he  can  make  no  distinction  between  appear- 
ances and  appearances,  and  cannot  base  his  action  upon  a  wise 
selection,  he  is  not  fit  to  be  at  large.  And  it  is  not  unknown, 
either  to  the  cliildhoodof  the  individual,  or  to  that  of  the  race, 
that  the  senses  have  to  do  with  appearances.  The  beginnings 
of  a  philosophy  of  knowledge  are,  thus,  in  the  very  hand  of 
every  man  not  too  heedless  to  be  capable  of  attention  or  too 
ingrained  a  dogmatist  to  tolerate  a  doubt. 

As  early  as  the  fifth  century  before  Christ,  Parmenides  of 
Elea  is  inspired  with  a  contempt  for  appearances,  and  treats 
with  severity  the  men  who  are  so  misguided  as  to  trust  to  the 
illusor}^  reports  of  the  senses.  Between  Being,  the  really 
existent,  and  the  empty  semblance  which  displays  itself  before 
the  sense,  he  draws  a  sharp  distinction.  Things  seem  to  us 
manifold  and  changing,  but  these  manifold  and  changing 
things  belong  to  the  deceptive  world  of  appearance.  True 
being  is  one  and  changeless,  and  can  be  known  only  by  thought. 
Zeno  steps  nimbly  to  the  side  of  Parmenides,  and  deals  our 


The  Problem  of  Everybody  s  World  19 

faltering  faith  in  the  things  that  seem  to  be  a  crushing  blow 
with  ingenious  arguments,  now  for  many  centuries  the  dehght 
of  those  who  love  puzzles  and  paradoxes  —  the  point  that 
cannot  move  in  infinitely  divisible  space,  because  it  cannot  find, 
in  such,  any  space  small  enough  to  begin  with ;  Achilles,  vainly 
endeavoring  to  find  the  end  of  the  endless  series  of  diminishing 
distances  that  separate  him  from  the  slowly  moving  tortoise. 

Whatever  we  may  have  to  say  as  to  the  cogency  of  the  argu- 
ments of  Zeno,  their  moral  is  plain.  If  the  world  of  appear- 
ances is  so  bad  that  things  and  their  motions  annihilate  them- 
selves by  sheer  force  of  their  own  inconceivability,  then,  by  all 
means,  let  us  withdraw  our  respect  from  such  a  world,  and  let 
us  set  our  affections  on  another. 

These  Eleatics  seem,  however,  to  have  overshot  their  mark. 
The  problem  set  for  mankind  is  to  find  a  world  in  or  through 
appearances.  The  philosopher  who  throws  away  all  appear- 
ances, and  who  presents  us  with  a  world  out  of  hJs  own  head, 
suggests  to  us  the  conjurer,  who  covers  his  table  with  incredible 
things  drawn  from  a  hat.  He  who  goes  so  far  as  to  say  that  the 
senses  always  deceive  us  gives  us  no  shadow  of  a  reason  why 
some  appearances  should  be,  as  they  manifestly  are,  preferred 
before  others.  He  does  not  explain  to  us  the  difference  between 
perceiving  things  well,  perceiving  them  ill,  and  not  perceiving 
them  at  all.  The  ''real  existence,"  which  he  venerates,  simply 
hibernates  in  some  secret  recess  of  its  own ;  it  does  not  Hft 
its  finger  to  present  us  with  this  appearance  or  with  that.  The 
universe  of  those  who  thus  deal  with  being  is  a  split  pea,  the 
halves  of  which  have  lost  each  other.  That  is  to  say,  it  is  not 
a  universe. 

From  Parmenides  on,  there  is  a  stately  procession  of  those 
who  have  felt  impelled  to  try  a  fall  with  the  problem  of  appear- 
ance and  reahty.  Some  have  taken  the  matter  hghtly,  some 
with  desperate  seriousness.  Granted  a  lively  sense  of  the  need 
of  drawing  the  distinction,  and  granted  also  a  somewhat  higher 


20  The  World  We  Live  In 

respect  for  the  facts  revealed  in  our  common  experience  than 
was  possessed  by  the  devotees  of  abstract  thought  criticized 
above,  it  was  inexitable  that  another  theory  should  emerge. 
Empedocles  set  up  his  hypothesis  of  "efBuxes"  from  objects 
entering  into  ''pores"  adapted  to  them,  and  giving  rise  to  our 
sensations.  We  have  here  in  a  crude  form  the  common  sense 
doctrine  that  physical  things  act  upon  us  and  we  know  them. 
This  common  sense  doctrine  has,  on  the  whole,  held  its  own 
through  the  ages,  and  it  is  accepted  by  the  man  who  touches  us 
with  his  elbow  to-day.  It  has  been  criticized  in  past  centuries 
very  much  as  it  is  still  criticized  in  our  philosophical  journals ; 
but  men  have  gone  on  believing  it  in  spite  of  criticism,which, 
by  the  way,  seems  rarely  to  be  fatal  to  a  philosophical  position 
of  any  sort. 

The  doctrine  strikes  men  as,  if  not  wholly  satisfactory,  at 
least  not  without  something  to  recommend  it.  In  the  first 
place,  it  is  vague,  and  says  little,  except  when  taken  up  and 
spun  out  into  details  by  some  philosopher.  In  the  second  place, 
it  does  seem  to  be  a  way  of  accounting  for  appearances. 

To  be  sure,  there  are,  as  has  been  indicated  earlier  in  this 
chapter,  difficulties  enough  in  the  path  of  the  man  who  cares  to 
consider  difficulties.  Our  common  experience  suggests  that 
our  senses  have  their  limitations.  We  are  not  surprised  to  find 
Anaxagoras  teaching  that  they  are  too  weak  to  discern  the 
ultimate  constituents  of  things;  nor  to  hear  the  Atomists, 
who  elaborated  the  theory  of  material  images  emitted  by  objects 
and  reaching  the  mind,  admit  that  perception  is  not  wholly 
veracious.  If  a  man  goes  as  far  as  this,  how  can  he,  in  good 
conscience,  refuse  to  go  to  the  end  of  the  road  with  the  Sophist  ? 
Things  arc  not  appearances ;  we  have  only  appearances,  never 
the  things ;  the  appearances  are  related  to  our  senses  and  hence 
constitute  a  truth  all  our  own.  This  is  our  truth,  our  world; 
let  the  unknown  and  hypothetical  beyond  shift  for  itself;  to 
us,  it  is  nothing. 


The  Problem  of  Everybody  s  World  21 

Man,  said  Protagoras,  is  the  measure  of  all  things.  Since 
his  day,  others  have  walled  themselves  up  in  this  same  thought, 
dying  to  the  world  logically,  if  not  actually.  That  enfant 
terrible,  Gorgias,  with  his,  "nothing  exists;  if  anything  did 
exist,  we  could  not  know  it,"  and  the  rest,  seems  furiously 
determined  to  reject  every  universe  that  he  cannot  wholly 
possess  and  break  in  pieces  at  his  pleasure.  The  world  of  his 
seemings  is  enough  for  him  —  in  his  professional  capacity,  of 
course.  Aristippus,  a  more  reasonable  creature,  cautiously 
asserts  that  we  can  know  only  our  sensations,  not  what  causes 
them. 

If  we  take  this  turning,  we  are  reduced  to  appearances ;  we 
have  lost  the  things,  and  with  them  the  explanation  of  appear- 
ances that  they  are  supposed  to  furnish.  To  say  things  are, 
but  we  can  never  know  what  they  are,  is  as  bad  as  saying  that 
they  are  not.  They  are  lost  to  us,  in  any  case;  they  mean 
nothing.  One  cannot  base  a  theory  of  the  hereditary  transmis- 
sion of  mental  and  physical  traits  on  the  vague  information  that 
everybody  has  parents  but  nobody's  ancestors  can  be  identified. 
It  has  not  pleased  men  generally  to  take  tliis  turning. 

It  did  not  please  Plato,  who,  while  maintaining  the  existence 
of  the  supersensuous  world  of  higher  realities  with  which  we 
associate  his  name,  nevertheless  thought  fit  to  accept  a  physical 
world  of  things  acting  upon  the  senses  and  giving  rise  to  appear- 
ances. The  knowledge  of  such  things  he  regards  as  "opinion" 
rather  than  knowledge;  but  he  could  not  repudiate  it  alto- 
gether, and  he  stands  as  one  of  the  champions  of  the  Em- 
pedoclean  doctrine.^ 

Nor  did  that  wonderful  man,  Aristotle,  inchne  to  follow  the 
seductive  lead  of  the  Sophist.  He  was  too  much  the  man  of 
science  for  that  —  too  conscious  that  there  is  a  world  which  we 
know  and  the  insistent  features  of  which  we  are  not  at  liberty 
to  deny.  To  him,  the  thing  existed  before  it  made  an  impression 
on  the  organ  of  sense ;  it  set  in  motion  this  or  that  medium  and, 


2  2  The  World  We  Live  In 

through  it,  stimulated  the  organ  to  a  reaction ;  with  this  reaction 
there  arose  sensation.  How  did  he  distinguish  between  the 
sensation  and  its  object  ?  Not  precisely  as  did  those  who  pre- 
ceded him.  That  which  is  and  that  which  is  perceived  are,  in  a 
sense,  one,  and  yet  they  are  distinguishable ;  the  object  com- 
municates to  the  sense  organ  its  "form,"  not  its  "matter," 
and  thus  comes  to  be  perceived  as  it  is.^ 

In  centuries  to  follow  the  authority  of  Aristotle  was  to  play  a 
role  of  enormous  importance.  So  penetrated  was  he  with  the 
conviction  that  physical  motions  exist  and  are  to  be  regarded  as 
the  antecedents  of  sensation,  that  he  could  not  seriously  ask, 
with  Protagoras,  whether  our  knowledge  is  not  determined  by 
the  character  of  our  sense  organs  and  limited  to  what  is  given 
in  the  sense.  He  shrewdly  points  out  that,  if  everything  is 
sensation,  nothing  is  sensation,  for  there  is  no  such  thing  as  an 
organ  of  sense ;  and  he  dismisses  the  doubt  of  the  skeptic  to 
the  company  of  such  idle  questions  as  whether  we  are  now  asleep 
or  awake.  ^ 

Nevertheless,  with  all  his  acuteness,  Aristotle  did  not  really 
furnish  a  solution  of  the  difficulties  which  had  teased  men  be- 
fore. After  his  time,  men  came  back  to  them.  The  Stoic  dis- 
tinguished sharply  between  the  thing  and  the  mental  impression 
made  by  the  thing.  He  affirmed  dogmatically  that  percepts 
testify  to  the  existence  of  their  objects,  but  even  he  was  forced 
to  admit  that  the  testimony  of  this  or  that  psychical  witness 
might  be  called  in  question.^  Epicurus,  with  easy-going  good 
nature,  declared  true  even  the  hallucinations  of  the  insane, 
and  dreams,  on  the  ground  that  they  produce  an  impression, 
which  the  nonexistent  could  not  do.^  Such  a  generous  treat- 
ment of  appearances,  if  uncorrected,  can  only  embarrass  the  man 
who  is  in  search  of  external  realities  to  explain  appearances. 

Then  there  come  the  schools  of  the  Skeptics,  of  the  men  to 
whom  the  problem  of  the  world  does  not  seem  to  find  its  satis- 
factory solution  in  dogmatic  affirmation.     Appearances  they 


The  Problem  of  Everybody  s  World  23 

are  willing  to  admit ;  the  realities  that  correspond  to  them  they 
seek  in  vain.  Are  not  different  creatures,  they  argue,  endowed 
with  different  kinds  of  sense  organs  ?  The  resulting  impressions 
made  by  objects  must  be  different.  Who  will  venture  to  say 
what  an  object  is  really  Hke  ?  And  men  differ  from  each  other, 
and  the  various  senses  of  man  differ  from  one  another.  Where 
is  our  rehable  witness,  and  by  what  mark  is  he  known  ?  ^ 

The  naive  references  made  by  the  ancient  skeptic  to  the 
peculiarities  of  the  Arabian  Phoenix,  of  worms,  of  the  hungry 
goat,  of  the  steward  of  Alexander,  and  of  Andron  the  Argive, 
who  did  not  drink,  may  elicit  a  smile.  All  sorts  of  considerations 
are  poured  upon  us,  as  might  be  expected  from  men  rather 
unsystematically  supporting  the  thesis  of  the  relativity  of  all 
knowledge.  But  quite  enough  is  said  to  make  us  realize  that 
we  are  in  the  presence  of  a  real  problem,  and  a  very  modern  one. 
We  do  not  furnish  a  solution  of  that  problem  in  pointing  out,  as 
did  Aristotle,  that  the  skeptic  is  inconsistent. 

Of  course  the  skeptic  is  inconsistent,  whether  he  be  Protag- 
oras or  Pyrrho,  Aristippus  or  Agrippa.  He  is  inconsistent  in 
theor>%  and  he  is  inconsistent  in  practice.  He  has  no  right  to 
talk  of  objects,  sense  organs,  and  resulting  impressions,  as  if 
they  existed  and  were  open  to  inspection,  and  then  to  deny  a 
knowledge  of  all  save  impressions.  And  having  told  us  that  we 
know  nothing,  he  has  no  right  to  conduct  himself  with  propri- 
ety and  prudence,  as  though  he  knew  a  great  deal.  The  Pyr- 
rhonic  abstension  from  judgment  is  a  bit  of  pompous  pretense, 
an  attitude  to  be  taken  in  the  pulpit,  and  to  be  abandoned 
incontinently  when  one  appears  in  the  street. 

But  it  is  one  thing  to  point  out  that  the  skeptic  is  inconsist- 
ent and  another  to  point  out  what  may  reasonably  be  substi- 
tuted for  his  philosophy  of  negation.  If  we  content  ourselves 
with  the  conviction  that  we  know  things  "  somehow "  through 
our  sensations  and  ideas,  we  have  parted  company  with  the 
philosophers.     We  are  again  placid  citizens  of  Everybody's 


24  The  World  We  Live  In 

Worlfl,  for  whom  [)roblcms  do  not  exist,  simply  because  they 
arc  ignf^rod. 

Truly,  it  seems  as  though,  for  the  thinker,  the  misfortune  of 
having  a  body  is  second  only  to  that  of  having  none.  He  who 
has  a  body  has  senses ;  he  rises  every  morning  to  his  game  of 
hide  and  seek  with  the  things  that  conceal  themselves  in  ap- 
I)earances  or  behind  them  ;  the  distinction  of  subjective  and  ob- 
jective, f)sychical  and  f)hysical,  haunts  him  like  an  unpaid  debt. 

lOvcn  an  unpaid  debt,  however,  becomes  not  intolerable  to  the 
man  who  has  more  serious  concerns  to  occupy  him.  With  the 
[)assing  of  the  pagan  schools,  the  f)hilosopher  became  first  of 
all  a  theologian,  fie  was  inclined,  in  so  far  as  he  doubted  at 
all,  to  doubt,  "without  sin,  of  things  to  be  believed,"  as  did 
Augustine.  To  men  of  this  temper,  the  problem  of  Everybody's 
World  becomes  a  less  absorbing  one.  Augustineknew  very  well 
what  might  be  s:iid  in  favor  of  skepticism  ;  he  gave  the  prefer- 
ence to  (he  psychical,  making  material  things  objects  of  faith. 
Mut  he  did  not  seriously  doubt  what  he  seemed  to  perceive 
about  \\\\\\?  Ami  liming  the  (cnturies  in  which  the  medieval 
(liunli  |>liil()Sophy  was  growing  and  ripening,  a  period  the  philo- 
8<>phi(al  thinking  of  which  was  largely  controlled  by  Aristo- 
telian tonteptions,  men  were  content  with  the  doctrine  of 
"forms"  impressed  by  objects  ui)()ii  the  senses  —  representa- 
tives testifying  In  I  lie  things  which  give  rise  to  them.^ 

Hut  in  the  fourteenth  and  fifteenth  centuries  there  arose  a 
bolder  s|)iril  of  (  rilicism.  Tims.  William  of  Occam  maintains 
that  ovir  internal  states  are  more  certain  than  sense-perception. 
IVrcepts  hi'  regardsassignsof  things  rather  than  copies,  as  smoke 
may  be  a  sign  of  hre  without  resembling  it."-*  We  cannot, 
suggests  Pierre  d'Ailly.  I)e  ileceived  as  to  our  own  existence,  but 
it  is  eoneeivable  that  our  belief  in  external  objects  is  erroneous. 
('»)uld  not  (lod,  by  his  almighty  power,  give  us  the  same  sensa- 
tions if  there  were  no  external  objects?  '" 

( )ne  is  tempted  to  ask  this  champion  of   the  superior  cer- 


The  Problem  of  Everybody  s  World  25 

tainty  of  our  internal  states  what  becomes  of  the  inside  of  a 
hat  when  the  outside  has,  by  almighty  power,  been  annihilated  ? 
Is  it  still  the  inside  of  a  hat  ?  And  what  can  I  mean  by  my 
sensations,  if  I  deny  senses  and  objects  affecting  them  ?  What 
marks  a  sensation  as  such?  Where  does  it  get  its  name? 
The  skeptic  manifestly  does  not  take  away  enough.  He  robs  a 
man  of  his  wealth,  and  leaves  him  still  rich,  or,  at  any  rate, 
possessed  of  unlimited  credit.  If  he  will  avoid  inconsistency, 
let  him  take  away  all  or  none ;  this  eating  cake  and  keeping  it 
is  no  proper  occupation  for  a  philosopher.  Nevertheless,  it  has 
busied  the  skeptic  from  a  very  early  time,  and  there  are  those 
who  are  not  willing  to  desist  even  in  our  day. 

We  have  seen  how  our  problem  has  come  down  through  the 
ages  to  the  modern  man.  Something  seems  to  be  lacking  in 
the  solutions  offered  us.  Everybody's  World  appears,  it  al- 
ways has  appeared,  to  the  man  in  the  street,  to  be  a  world  di- 
rectly revealed  in  perception.  Are  we  not  all  the  man  in  the 
street,  when  we  leave  our  study  or  our  lecture  room  ?  We 
live  in  a  world ;  we  do  not  merely  speculate  about  it.  By 
the  philosophers  this  world  has  been  pushed  away,  thrust  out  of 
sight,  made  a  party  to  correspond  with  through  a  medium,  not 
an  acquaintance  whom  we  meet  face  to  face.  WTiat  is  granted 
us  is  not  a  vision,  but  a  reflection  ;  not  a  voice,  but  an  echo  — 
and  there  is  always  the  haunting  suspicion  that  behind  the  re- 
flection, the  echo,  there  may  be  nothing  at  all  or  nothing  that 
means  anything  to  us. 

Some  problems  cease  to  be  such  with  the  increase  of  human 
knowledge  in  the  field  of  the  special  sciences.  For  their  solu- 
tion or  their  dismissal  what  we  need  is  information.  Thus,  the 
question,  whether  the  Skiopodes,  who  occasioned  theological 
perplexities  to  Augustine,  are  or  are  not  to  be  accounted  as  men, 
falls  of  itself  when  it  is  discovered  that  those  one-legged 
eccentricities  never  existed.  But  the  problem  of  reflection  with 
which  we  have  been  concerned  does  not  belong  to  this  class. 


26  The  World  We  Live  In 

In  the  seventeenth  century  more  was  known  of  the  signifi- 
cance of  brain  and  nerves  than  was  known  earlier.     Never- 
theless, that  acute  and  original  genius  Descartes  stood  just  where 
Pierre   d'Ailly   had    stood    two    centuries   before.     He   could 
put  the  soul  into  the  pineal  gland,  and  could  explain  the  mecha- 
nism of  the  body  by  which  the  impressions  made  by  external 
things  are  conducted  to  the  brain.     But  this  is  physiological 
knowledge,  and  assumes  the  existence  of  an  outer  world  which 
stiU  remains  to  him  problematic.     He  followed  an  ancient  tradi- 
tion and  shut  himself  up  to  images,  copies,  ideas ;   how  prove 
that  anything  exists  beyond  tliis  barrier,  impenetrable  to  him  ? 
The  skeptic  might  talk  to  him  precisely  as  he  might  have  talked 
to  Empedocles,  and  the  advance  of  science  could  not  put  into  his 
hand  a  single  weapon  to  help  him  to  repel  the  attack.     He  is 
reduced   to  maintaining   that   God   helps   those  who   cannot 
possibly  help  themselves,  and,  as  He  is  benevolently  unwilling 
to  deceive  us  into  thinking  that  there  is  an  external   world 
when  there  is  none,  one  must  really  exist."     Thus,  Descartes 
assumes  a  duplicate  world,  a  world  unseen,  unfelt,  present  to  the 
mind  only  by  proxy ;   a  world  which  we  have  never  had,  and 
never  can  have,  in  itself ;  a  world  cut  off  from  observation  and 
verification,  the  doubtful  conclusion,  as  it  seems  to  us  now,  of  a 
dubious  bit  of  deductive  reasoning  from  absiu-d  premises.     John 
Locke,  to  whom  the  British  philosophy  owes  so  much,  felt  the 
push  of  the  same  tradition.     He,  too,  shut  himself  up  to  ideas, 
and  put  the  things  represented  by  them  at  one  remove.    He  is, 
however,  less  of  a  scholastic  than  Descartes,  and   his  robust 
common  sense  carries  with  it  a  flavor  of  the  ancient  dogmatism.^^ 
It  would  be  absurd  to  maintain  that  two  such  sensible  men 
as  Descartes  and  Locke  fully  realized  how  completely  they  had 
banished  the  material  world,  how  absolutely  they  had  lost  it. 
They  were  influenced,  on  the  one  hand,  by   a  venerable  tradi- 
tion, according  to  which  things  psychical  are  known  more 
immediately  and  more  intimately  than  are  other  things.      But 


The  Problem  of  Everybody  s  World  27 

they  were  influenced  no  less  by  the  perennial  problem  which  con- 
fronts us  all,  the  problem  of  finding  a  world  of  things  in  appear- 
ances, and,  thus,  of  assigning  to  appearances  their  place  in  the 
world.  If,  under  the  former  influence,  they  were  betrayed  into 
seeking  their  things  rather  behind  appearances  than  in  them ; 
yet,  under  the  latter,  they  were  induced  to  retrace  their  steps, 
and  to  recognize  the  things  we  see  and  touch  to  be  originals  and 
not  mere  copies.  There  is  abundant  evidence  in  their  works  to 
prove  that  they  were  saved  by  this  conservative  instinct  from 
shipwreck  upon  the  rock  of  consistency.^^ 

Since  their  time  it  has  been  so  much  the  fashion  in  philo- 
sophic circles  to  assume  that  things  psychical  are  known  with  a 
pecuHar  intimacy  and  immediacy,  that  one  feels  almost  com- 
pelled to  apologize  for  defending  any  other  form  of  doctrine. 
Some  have  not  fallen  in  with  the  fashion,  it  is  true ;  but,  among 
philosophers  by  profession,  these  may  be  regarded  as,  on  the 
whole,  exceptions.  Certain  writers  who  profess  not  to  follow 
the  fashion  can  be  seen,  when  we  scan  attentively  the  cut  of 
their  garments,  to  have  been  more  affected  by  it  than  they  sup- 
pose. Many  have  accepted  the  duplicate  world,  the  world  at 
one  remove.     To  what  are  such  men  committed  ? 

Remember  that,  to  those  who  take  their  doctrine  seriously, 
there  is  no  peep-hole  in  the  curtain.  Whether  the  duplicate 
world  exists  at  all  or  is  a  mere  fiction  cannot  be  decided  by  an 
appeal  to  direct  inspection.  Nor  may  we  anywhere  have  re- 
course to  observation,  to  immediate  observation,  when  we  ad- 
dress ourselves  to  the  task  of  telHng  what  the  things  in  the  dupli- 
cate world  are  Hke.  Everywhere  we  are  shut  up  to  an  infer- 
ence from  appearances. 

Shall  we  assume  that  the  things  inferred  are  precisely  like 
the  things  we  perceive?  that  the  latter  are  true  copies? 
But  the  things  we  perceive  appear,  as  we  have  seen,  imder  a 
variety  of  guises.  Which  one  of  these  can  be  proved  to  be  the 
true  copy  of  the  original  and  only  external  thing  ?      As  early  as 


28  TJie  World  We  Live  In 

the  fifth  century  before  Christ  men  felt  impelled  to  conclude  that 
things  cannot  be  precisely  like  what  seem  to  present  them- 
selves as  things.  Like  Locke,  they  granted  the  things  only  cer- 
tain of  the  properties  given  in  our  experience,  and  made  the  rest 
subjective  effects  of  what  is  external,  signs,  if  you  please,  but 
not  copies.^^  To  stop  with  this  seems  arbitrary.  If  what  is 
really  not  colored  can  cause  me  to  perceive  color,  how  can  I  be 
sure  that  what  is  not  extended  may  not  cause  me  to  perceive 
extended  things  ?  He  who  asks  such  questions  makes  a  very 
grave  assault  upon  the  dupHcate  world,  and  I  turn  a  deaf  ear  to 
him  for  the  moment.  Let  us  first  ask  something  else  that  does 
not  seem  impertinent  to  the  problem  of  the  duplicate  world, 
still  recognizable  as  a  world,  if  a  washed-out  one. 

Remember  that  there  is  no  peep-hole  in  the  curtain.  How, 
then,  shall  we  answer  one  who  asks  us:  Where  are  the  things  in 
this  duplicate  world?  What  is  their  distance  and  direction 
from  the  things  that  we  seem  to  perceive  ?  Can  we  point  to  a 
single  one  of  them  and  feel  sure  that  we  are  pointing  in  the  right 
direction?  The  finger  with  which  we  point,  the  direction  in 
which  we  point,  belong  to  the  world  of  our  perceptions,  not  to 
its  double.  And  when  do  occurrences  take  place  in  this  realm  of 
the  merely  inferred  ?  Dates,  to  be  dates,  must  have  a  meaning ; 
and  I  cannot  find  any  meaning  for  my  "  when,"  if  I  abandon  the 
world  of  my  experience  for  an  unknown.  How  in  the  world  is 
anything  in  tliis  duplicate  world  related  to  the  things  I  see,  or 
hear,  or  touch  ?  How  can  it  beget  such  experiences  ?  To  such 
questions  no  answer  appears  to  be  forthcoming. 

It  has  seemed  to  some  that  we  make  less  troublesome  such 
perplexing  questions  as  these,  if  we  muffle  the  voice  that  asks 
them,  to  such  a  degree  that  it  becomes  no  longer  recognizable 
as  a  voice  asking  a  definite  question.  How  easy  to  describe  a 
landscape  which  has  melted,  with  the  shades  of  night,  into  the 
invisible.  And  how  easy  to  satisfy  the  questioner  who  is  con- 
tent to  be  put  off  with  a  munnur  wliich  need  bear  no  semblance 


The  Problem  of  Everybody  s  World  29 

to  articulate  speech.  The  train  of  reflection  that  led  men  to 
maintain  that  the  real  things  without  us  are  not  precisely  like 
what  we  perceive  need  only  be  carried  a  httle  farther  to  dissolve 
our  collection  of  dupUcates  into  a  something  or  nothing  that  has 
lost  all  semblance  to  a  world  of  any  sort. 

If  the  whole  world  of  our  experience  is  a  vain  show,  is  a  veil 
that  divides  us  from  reality,  how  can  we,  admitting  that  there  is 
such  a  reality,  ever  know  even  remotely  what  it  is  like,  what  it 
does,  how  it  does  it  ?  The  only  logical  answer  seems  to  be  that 
we  cannot  know,  and  that  it  is  a  mistake  to  conceive  of  this 
reahty  as  a  world  of  things  at  all.  If  we  can  persuade  ourselves, 
as  did  Herbert  Spencer,  that  there  is  a  certain  impiety  in  want- 
ing to  know  anything  about  it,  so  much  the  better  for  our  peace 
of  mind  —  we  are  enabled  to  lay  a  soothing  plaster  over  the 
ache  of  our  ignorance.  Those  who  treat  the  dupHcate  world 
in  this  way  demoHsh  it,  it  is  true ;  but  they  preserve  its 
shadow.  They  retain  a  something  which  is  supposed  to  fulfill 
some  of  the  functions  that  the  natural  man  attributes  to  a  world 
of  things.  Their  featureless  surrogate  for  an  external  world 
proclaims  them  with  its  half-obliterated  tongue  to  be  of  the 
party  of  the  ancient  skeptics. 

I  shall  not  criticize  at  length  this  ghost  of  a  duphcate  world, 
which  so  many  of  our  countrymen  associate  with  the  name  of  the 
remarkable  man  mentioned  just  above.  I  shall  merely  remind 
my  reader  that  what  is  vague  enough  to  serve  as  an  answer  to 
every  question  is  really  an  answer  to  no  question.  With  what 
emotions  should  we  contemplate  the  man  who  coupled  every 
definite  answer  to  a  definite  question  with  the  wearisome 
refrain,  "but  the  Unknowable  is  the  ultimate  cause  of  the 
transaction."  After  a  few  repetitions,  we  should  exclaim, 
"  Spare  us  the  refrain ;  give  us  only  the  first  half  of  the  answer." 

The  last  half  is  manifestly  a  survival,  without  functional  sig- 
nificance ;  an  appendix,  which  can  do  nothing  for  us,  but  may 
cause  embarrassment,  and  were  better  amputated.     Histori- 


o 


o  The  World  We  Live  In 


cally  it  is  interesting.  It  is  a  by-product  of  the  very  natural 
attempt  which  men  have  made  to  explain  appearances  by  having 
recourse  to  things.  The  turn  taken  by  the  argument  has  resulted 
in  the  loss  of  the  things  sought  for,  and  hence  in  the  shipwreck 
of  this  particular  attempt  at  explanation. 

Having  referred  to  Spencer,  it  seems  only  just  that  I  should 
make  a  passing  reference  to  Kant,  from  whom  Spencer  indi- 
rectly got  his  doctrine.  The  German  philosopher  applied  to 
his  Unknowable  the  somewhat  unhappy  expression  "things-in- 
themselves,"  which  would  suggest  to  us  that  the  dupHcate  world 
was  retained,  in  its  most  general  features,  at  least.  But  the 
suggestion  is  misleading.  Kant's  "  things-in- themselves "  are 
not  in  space ;  they  are  not  in  time ;  they  bear  no  conceivable 
relation  to  what  we  perceive  or  can  perceive ;  they  cannot  do 
anything ;  they  cannot,  in  any  intelUgible  sense  of  the  words, 
even  he  anytliing.  Kant's  immediate  successors  made  haste  to 
repudiate  them ;  and  many  of  liis  warmest  admirers  have  la- 
bored to  prove  that  he  himself  set  no  store  by  them,  after  all. 

Nevertheless,  the  "  thing-in-itself "  is  a  child  of  Kant.  It 
is  an  illegitimate  child ;  and  when  Kant  is,  as  I  think,  at 
his  best,  he  seems  ashamed  of  the  paternity,  treating  the 
creature  as  a  mere  negative  conception,  a  something  as  good 
as  nothing.  Yet  we  must  admit  that  this  reluctantly  acknowl- 
edged brat  was  the  Cordelia  on  whom  he  depended  for  the  com- 
forts of  his  old  age  —  God,  Freedom,  and  Immortality.  These 
he  got,  in  his  "Critique  of  the  Practical  Reason,"  by  granting 
his  theoretical  nonentity  enough  of  a  practical  being  to  exist 
and  to  have  some  significance.  The  proper  place,  however, 
for  "things-in-themselves"  is  evidently  not  a  dupUcate  world, 
but  the  desert  left  by  its  demolition.  They  are  treated  with 
extreme  rigor,  being  denied  every  single  property  by  which  a 
thing  can  be  known  as  a  thing. 

It  is  with  some  diffidence  that  I  speak  of  Kant,  for  the  Kantian 
literature  is  piled  up  mountains  high,  and  a  cough  can   dis- 


The  Problem  of  Everybody  s  World  31 

lodge  an  avalanche.  But  I  intend  to  come  back  to  this  won- 
derful man  later ;  and  I  hope  to  show  that,  in  spite  of  the 
burden  of  tradition  that  weighted  his  sturdy  little  shoulders, 
he  hit  with  remarkable  sagacity  upon  the  path  which  we  must 
follow  if  we  would  arrive  at  a  reasonable  solution  of  the  problem 
of  Everybody's  World.  He  did  not  follow  that  path  up  to  the 
end,  nor  did  he  prevent  our  wandering  from  it,  by  setting  up 
guide  posts  at  every  parting  of  the  ways.  Still,  he  made  it 
possible  for  us  to  set  our  faces  in  the  right  direction. 

We  have  had  recently  in  our  philosophical  journals  a  good 
deal  of  sharp  criticism  directed  against  the  "copy"  theory  of 
truth.  The  history  of  speculative  thought  seems  to  show 
that  such  criticism  is  abundantly  justified.  The  problem  of 
the  world  of  common  knowledge  demands  some  better  solution. 
It  is  well  to  bear  in  mind,  however,  that,  if  it  is  a  misfortune  to 
make  shipwreck  on  the  Scylla  of  a  duplicate  world  which  we  can 
never  know,  it  is  no  less  a  misfortune  to  be  engulfed  in  the 
Charybdis  of  no  real  world  at  all,  to  sink  in  the  chaos  of  ap- 
pearances. The  problem  of  Everybody's  World  is  not  how  to 
get  two  worlds ;  it  is  not  how  to  dispense  with  any ;  it  is  how  to 
find  our  world  in  the  appearances  in  which  it  is  evident  that 
men  really  do  somehow  lay  hold  of  it. 


CHAPTER  III 

THE   WORLD  AS  IDEA 

We  do  a  grievous  wrong  to  the  independent  genius  of  that 
most  original  thinker  Berkeley,  if  we  confuse  his  bold  solution 
of  the  worid-problem  with  the  efforts  of  any  of  his  predecessors. 
The  problem  which  confronted  him  was,  of  course,  the  same  as 
that  which  stared  them  in  the  face.  It  is  the  same  that  chal- 
lenges our  curiosity  and  enchains  our  interest.  Everybody's 
World  existed  for  the  ancient  Greek  and  for  the  medieval 
Churchman  as  it  exists  for  the  modern  American  or  European. 
There  it  stood  with  all  its  seeming  inconsistency,  as  it  stands 
now ;  unmistakably  there,  but  enshrouded  in  obscurity,  half- 
revealed,  making  a  mock  of  men's  efforts  at  reflection,  beckon- 
ing them  on  to  draw  aside  the  veil  and  to  shed  the  light  of  day 
upon  the  mystery  of  its  being. 

Spontaneous  generation  has  yet  to  be  established  by  the  man 
of  science.  Of  the  spontaneous  generation  of  the  philosopher 
we  need  take  no  account  at  all.  A  Kant  or  a  Hegel  who  should 
start  up  unannounced  on  the  banks  of  the  Congo  or  on  the  up- 
lands of  Thibet  would  be  a  lusjis  nalurcB,  a  philosophic  mon- 
strosity; either  a  thing  to  dismiss  at  once  with  those  whose 
heads  do  grow  beneath  their  shoulders,  or  a  creature  to  be 
recognized  as  a  clever  fraud.  There  are  no  Melchisedecs  in 
philosophy.  This  does  not  mean  that  there  is  no  such  thing 
as  originality ;  but  it  does  mean  that  philosophical  systems 
have  some  relation  to  the  culture  of  their  time ;  they  are  the 
natural  fruit  of  some  particular  tree,  and  no  theory  of  mutation 
justifies  us  in  planting  thistle  seeds  if  we  seek  to  have  figs. 

But  the  acute  realization  of  this  truth  may  lead  us  into  error. 

32 


The  World  as  Idea  33 

Every  thinking  man  has  his  world-problem  laid  before  him  by 
his  own  experience,  and  he  has  whatever  suggestions  toward  its 
solution  he  may  gather  from  his  contemporaries  or  his  prede- 
cessors. It  is  of  the  utmost  importance  to  distinguish  what 
really  has  been  his  contribution  to  speculative  thought,  and  to 
estimate  its  significance  in  the  light  of  the  influences  which  are 
known  to  have  surrounded  him.  If,  however,  we  scan  anx- 
iously the  pages  of  the  history  of  philosophy,  and  finding 
somewhere  in  it  some  doctrine  that  bears  a  remote  analogy 
to  the  utterances  of  our  philosopher,  or,  worse  yet,  some  doc- 
trine which,  though  very  different,  has  by  an  historical  acci- 
dent had  attached  to  it  the  same  or  a  similar  name  —  if,  I 
say,  happening  upon  such,  we  thereby  regard  ourselves  as  on 
the  track  of  an  affinity  and  an  important  explanation,  we  betray 
a  dullness  of  comprehension  that  cannot  be  redeemed  by  learn- 
ing. 

I  say  all  this  because  certain  persons,  who  use  the  word  ''ideal- 
ism" with  a  generous  vagueness  that  makes  it  almost  useless  as 
the  designation  of  anything  in  particular,  are  very  apt  to  hark 
back  from  Berkeley  to  Plato,  to  connect  the  doctrines  of  the  two 
men,  and  to  rob  Berkeley  of  his  just  due. 

It  is  quite  true  that  Plato  discoursed  of  a  world  of  "Ideas," 
of  certain  supersensible  realities  which  suggest  to  one  the  pat- 
terns shown  to  Moses  in  the  mount.  But  those  who  know 
Plato  best  ^  recognize  that  this  realm  of  "Ideas"  bears  a  much 
closer  resemblance  to  the  Parmenidean  "Being,"  cut  off,  as 
we  have  seen  in  the  last  chapter,  from  the  sphere  of  our  percep- 
tions, than  it  does  to  what  Berkeley  calls  ideas.  The  Platonic 
"Ideas"  are  nothing  psychical;  they  are  not  in  the  human 
mind ;  they  are  not  in  the  Divine  Mind  ;  they  are  something 
which  we  can  here  leave  out  of  account.^ 

In  his  later  Hfe,  and  when  he  wrote  his  curious  book  on  the 
Virtues  of  Tar-water,  that  universal  remedy  which  the  world 
had  so  long  sought,  Berkeley  was  influenced,  I  think,  to  his 


34  The   World  We  Live  In 


a 


detriment,  by  Plato.  But  when  his  youthful  genius  first 
spread  its  daring  wing,  and  broke  v/ith  a  long  tradition,  it 
began  its  flight  precisely  where  it  found  itself  at  the  beginning 
of  the  eighteenth  century.  Had  Berkeley  done  no  more  than 
serve  up  to  us  a  warmed-over  dish  of  broken  meats  taken  from 
the  upper  shelves  of  the  Platonic  or  Neo-Platonic  cupboard, 
he  would  never  have  held  in  the  history  of  philosophy  the  honor- 
able place  which  is  his  own  to-day. 

The  world  —  the  world  as  distinguished  from  our  percep- 
tions of  the  world — had  been  pushed  out  of  sight  and  as  good 
as  lost.  It  was  represented  in  experience  only  by  certain 
proxies,  by  ideas.  The  word  "idea"  John  Locke  had  defined  ^ 
as  "whatsoever  is  the  object  of  the  understanding  when  a  man 
thinks."  Taken  literally,  this  would  imply  that  a  man  can- 
not even  think  about  tilings  as  distinguished  from  ideas,  but 
Locke  was  no  extremist.  To  him  the  ideas  alone  were  known 
immediately,  but  some  ideas  represented  things.  The  things 
were  the  choir  of  heaven  and  furniture  of  the  earth  ;  the  ideas 
were  in  the  mind,  copies  or  indications  of  things,  conveyed 
through  the  portals  of  sense.  It  was  upon  this  food  that  Berke- 
ley's early  years  were  nourished. 

It  is  the  prerogative  of  the  man  of  genius  to  see  what  lies 
plainly  before  us  all  and  yet  remains  invisible.  Berkeley  was 
not  overburdened  by  learning  and  he  was  not  a  slave  to  tradi- 
tion. He  simply  opened  his  eyes  and  saw  what  men  might 
have  seen  long  before,  namely,  that  a  dupHcate  world  of  any 
sort  so  wholly  cut  off  from  observation  cannot  possibly  be  a 
world  for  us.  It  is  no  more  than  the  shadow  cast  upon  the  void 
by  the  world  we  have.  It  is  a  hypothetical  shadow,  a  prepos- 
terous shadow,  one  which  cannot  be  proved  to  exist,  and  which 
must  be  assumed  without  a  shade  of  a  reason. 

Accordingly,  he  threw  away  this  dupHcate  world.  He  did  not 
merely  blur  it,  rob  it  of  light  and  color,  obliterate  its  contours, 
and  blow  sentimental  sighs  with  the  skeptic  over  the  fact  that 


The   World  as  Idea  35 

we  cannot  know  what  it  is.  He  cheerfully  tossed  it  away,  and 
then  told  men  that  he  had  thrown  away  nothing  at  all,  as  there 
really  had  been  nothing  to  throw.  Appearances  remained ; 
appearances,  wliich  he  had  been  taught  to  call  ideas.  In  these 
he  claimed  to  have  the  only  world  that  there  had  ever  been. 
To  be  sure,  these  appearances,  to  exist  at  all,  must  exist  in 
some  mind.    Where  else  than  in  a  mind  can  an  idea  exist  ? 

"It  is  indeed  an  opinion  strangely  prevailing  amongst 
men,"  he  writes,^  "that  houses,  mountains,  rivers,  and  in  a 
word  all  sensible  objects,  have  an  existence,  natural  or  real, 
distinct  from  their  being  perceived  by  the  understanding.  But, 
with  how  great  an  assurance  and  acquiescence  soever  this  prin- 
ciple may  be  entertained  in  the  world,  yet  whoever  shall  find 
in  his  heart  to  call  it  in  question  may,  if  I  mistake  not,  perceive 
it  to  involve  a  manifest  contradiction.  For,  what  are  the  fore- 
mentioned  objects  but  the  things  we  perceive  by  sense  ?  and 
what  do  we  perceive  besides  our  own  ideas  or  sensations  ?  and 
is  it  not  plainly  repugnant  that  any  one  of  these,  or  any  com- 
bination of  them,  should  exist  unperceived  ?  " 

The  doctrine  was  a  lightning  flash,  an  electric  shock,  a 
revolution.  The  dwellers  on  the  slopes  of  Vesuvius  were  not 
the  less  surprised  at  the  catastrophe  which  made  of  Hercu- 
laneum  and  Pompeii  a  pillar  of  salt,  from  the  fact  that  the 
mountain  had  already  given  them  warnings.  Men  can  go 
about  indefinitely  with  premises  in  their  heads,  and,  never- 
theless, avoid  precipitating  the  conclusion  which  they  hold  in 
solution.  But  some  day  there  comes  a  jar,  and  the  thing  is 
done ;  we  stand  open-mouthed  before  the  consequences  of  our 
own  thought. 

Had  not  the  world  admitted  for  centuries  that  the  things 
we  directly  and  immediately  perceive  are  sensations,  mental 
images,  forms,  something  which,  in  the  lump,  the  modern 
man  would  call  psychical  and  designate  as  subjective  ?  Had 
not  all  else  become  the  doubtful  result  of  a  questionable  infer- 


36  The   World  We  Live  In 

encc  ?  Did  it  ever  occur  to  any  one  that  sensations  or  ideas 
could  walk  off  and  set  up  for  themselves  independently  of  the 
mind  in  which  they  sprang  into  being  ?  What  becomes  of  a 
pain  when  no  one  feels  it  ?  What  becomes  of  a  percept  when 
no  one  is  perceiving  ?  As  well  abstract  the  cat  and  keep  the 
smile,  as  grant  to  ideas  such  an  existence  as  men  had  hitherto 
misguidedly  attributed  to  houses,  mountains,  and  rivers  ! 

Berkeley  met  the  men  of  his  day  on  their  own  ground,  and 
seemed  to  leave  them  without  such  weapons  as  a  philosopher 
may  deign  to  use.  Dogmatic  affirmation,  misconception,  and 
ridicule  are  for  the  vulgar ;  though  it  must  be  confessed  that  the 
learned  have  been  known  to  handle  such  bludgeons.  The  dog- 
matist continued  to  afffrm  that  the  duplicate  world  hung  sus- 
pended in  the  meaningless  "beyond."  The  chorus  raised  its 
protesting  voice :  Was  ever  the  like  heard  of  ?  do  we  eat  and 
drink  ideas  ?  do  we  draw  them  on,  and  button  them  up,  when 
we  rise  from  our  beds  ?  Bless  the  mark  !  why  not  walk  through 
a  locked  door,  if  it  is  only  an  idea  ? 

The  coolness  with  which  Berkeley  takes  it  for  granted  that 
other  men  should  deal  as  remorselessly  with  tradition  as  did 
he  is  perfectly  delicious.  It  is  a  great  thing  to  be  young,  and 
to  be  possessed  of  that  genius  that  gazes  upon  its  own  vision 
undeterred  by  the  apprehensions  of  those  who  hoard  maxims 
and  bow  down  before  the  wisdom  of  the  fathers.  "Some  truths 
there  are,"  he  tells  us,"*  "so  near  and  obvious  to  the  mind  that  a 
man  need  only  open  his  eyes  to  see  them.  Such  I  take  this 
important  one  to  be,  namely,  that  all  the  choir  of  heaven  and 
furniture  of  the  earth,  in  a  word  all  those  bodies  which  com- 
pose the  mighty  frame  of  the  world,  have  not  any  subsistence 
without  a  mind,  that  their  hcing  is  to  be  perceived  or  known ; 
that  consequently  so  long  as  they  are  not  actually  perceived 
by  me,  or  do  not  exist  in  my  mind  or  that  of  any  other  created 
spirit,  they  must  either  have  no  existence  at  all,  or  else  subsist 
in  the  mind  of  some  Eternal  Spirit  —  it  being  perfectly  unin- 


The   World  as  Idea  37 

telligible  ...  to  attribute  to  any  single  part  of  them  an  exist- 
ence independent  of  a  spirit." 

Thus,  according  to  the  new  doctrine,  nothing  can  be  said 
to  exist  save  spirits  and  the  ideas  of  those  spirits.  The  step 
which  had  been  taken  was  really  the  next  step  in  philosophy. 
The  only  knoivaUe  world  had  already  been  turned  into  a  world 
of  spirits  and  of  ideas ;  nothing  remained  save  to  recognize  that 
the  knowable  world  is  the  world. 

One  may  be  at  liberty  to  reject  both  Berkeley's  premises  and 
his  conclusion,  but  one  is  not  at  liberty,  at  this  late  date,  to  fall 
into  the  gross  misunderstandings  of  which  he  has  so  constantly 
been  the  victim.  He  was  preeminently  a  man  of  sense ;  a 
man  to  discriminate  most  carefully  between  appearances  and 
appearances,  giving  the  preference  to  those  which  the  expe- 
rience of  mankind  and  the  progress  of  knowledge  have  decided 
to  hold  in  honor.     His  world  of  ideas  is  not  a  chaos. 

Whatever  his  right  to  do  so,  he  accepts  and  emphasizes 
the  common  distinction  between  what  is  given  in  the  sense  and 
what  is  merely  imagined.  This  distinction  is  one  of  the  most 
striking  features  of  Everybody's  World.  It  is  recognized  by 
men  of  many  schools  and  by  men  of  none ;  no  man  can  consist- 
ently ignore  it  and  survive.  Berkeley  finds  two  kinds  of  ideas 
within  the  circle  of  his  experiences.^  He  can  excite  certain 
ideas  in  his  mind  at  his  pleasure  :  "it  is  no  more  than  wilhng, 
and  straightway  this  or  that  idea  arises  in  my  fancy ;  and  by  the 
same  power  it  is  obhterated  and  makes  way  for  another." 
But  he  realizes  that  the  ideas  "actually  perceived  by  Sense" 
have  not  a  like  dependence  on  his  will :  "When  in  broad  day- 
light I  open  my  eyes,  it  is  not  in  my  power  to  choose  whether  I 
shall  see  or  no,  or  to  determine  what  particular  objects  shall 
present  themselves  to  my  view  ;  and  so  likewise  as  to  the  hear- 
ing and  other  senses,  the  ideas  imprinted  on  them  are  not 
creatures  of  my  will.  There  is  therefore  some  other  Will  or 
Spirit  that  produces  them." 


38  The   World  We  Live  In 

To  Berkeley  both  things  imagined  and  things  perceived  are 
ideas,  but  it  is  clear  that  he  recognizes  different  orders  of  ideas. 
The  ideas  of  sense  are  strong,  lively,  distinct,  and  have  a  steadi- 
ness, order,  and  coherence  lacking  in  the  others.  They  are 
referred  to  organs  of  sense.  We  are  told  that  they  may  properly 
be  called  real  things,  and  ideas  of  imagination  may,  by  contrast, 
be  termed  ideas  or  images  of  things.  The  established  methods 
by  which  the  Divine  Mind  excites  the  former  in  us  are  the  laws 

of  nature. 

But  this  is  not  all.  Berkeley  makes  room  in  his  philosophy 
for  a  further  distinction  which  is  also  a  most  important  feature 
of  Ever>body's  World. 

I  hear  a  faint  and  indistinguishable  noise ;  I  see  upon  the 
horizon  a  dim  and  indefinite  speck.  I  do  not,  in  the  one  case, 
know  what  the  noise  means  ;  nor  do  I  know,  in  the  other,  what 
kind  of  an  object  I  am  looking  at.  Both  the  Berkeleyan  and 
the  man  who  has  no  theory  may  feel  sure  that  I  am  concerned 
here  with  sense  and  not  with  imagination.  They  may  both 
say  that  I  am  having  an  experience  of  "things."  But  had  I 
no  better  experience  of  things  than  this,  my  world  would  not 
be  a  world  —  things,  definitely  recognized  to  be  such,  would  not 
exist  for  me. 

A  coach  comes  ratthng  by,  and  I  now  know  what  was  meant 
by  that  sound.  The  dimly  discerned  speck  moves  and  changes, 
and  I  see  a  man  with  all  his  members.  If  I  am  asked  to  tell 
something  about  my  world,  to  describe  it,  to  what  experiences 
shall  I  have  recourse  ?  Do  they  all  stand  upon  the  same  level  ? 
Berkeley  would  never  have  become  a  bishop  had  he  been  capa- 
ble of  sa>'ing:  "Set  a  human  being  so  far  away  from  me  that 
he  becomes  indistinguishable  from  an  ant  hill,  and  I  will  tell 
you  what  he  is  like."  Our  philosopher  worked  out  with  much 
ingenuity  a  doctrine  of  the  relative  values  of  appearances,  point- 
ing out  which  should  be  taken  as  signs  or  indications,  and  which 
should  be  accounted  as  that  which  is  signified  by  those  signs ; 


The   World  as  Idea  39 

nor  did  he  overlook  the  fact  that  some  signs  are  not  as  satis- 
factory as  others.^ 

So  far,  then,  Berkeley  appears  to  have  been  very  desirous 
of  retaining  those  striking  features  of  Everybody's  World 
that  seem  vouched  for  by  the  common  experience  of  man.  Al- 
though he  called  all  sorts  of  things  ideas,  he  did  not  confuse 
a  man  imagined  with  a  man  seen,  nor  did  he  regard  any  and 
every  sense-impression  as  an  equally  satisfactory  presentation 
of  a  thing.  How,  then,  did  his  new  idealistic  philosophy  differ 
from  the  behef  of  all  the  world  —  I  will  not  say,  from  the  belief 
of  the  philosopher  urging  his  scholastic  doctrine  of  mental 
images  and  unperceived  duplicate  originals  —  but  from  the 
beUef  of  men  generally,  including  this  same  philosopher  in  his 
moments  of  relaxation  and  grown  human  ?  Was  Berkeley's 
ideahsm  but  a  name  ? 

The  man  himself  thought  that  he  was  obliterating  no  feature 
of  Everybody's  World. ^  He  did  not  mean  to  be  "a  setter-up 
of  new  notions."  His  object  was  "to  unite,  and  place  in  a 
clearer  light,  that  truth  which  was  before  shared  between  the 
vulgar  and  the  philosophers."  According  to  him,  the  former 
believe  that  those  things  they  immediately  perceive  are  the  real 
things,  and  the  latter  maintain  that  the  things  immediately 
perceived  are  ideas,  which  exist  only  in  the  mind.  Put  these 
opinions  together,  and  you  have  the  whole  truth.  "The  same 
Principles,"  we  read,  at  the  end  of  those  charming  dialogues  in 
which  the  materialist  is  brought  to  change  his  heart  of  stone  for 
an  idea  —  "the  same  Principles,  which,  at  first  view,  lead  to 
Skepticism,  pursued  to  a  certain  point,  bring  men  back  to 
Common  Sense." 

Common  Sense  !  Never  !  The  plain  man  is  no  more  a 
Berkeleyan  than  he  is  the  Dalai-lama.  Berkeley's  orthodoxy 
reminds  me  of  that  of  the  learned  German  Orientahst  who 
posed  as  the  champion  of  old-fashioned  theological  conserva- 
tism.    He  shook  his  head  over  the  free  treatment  accorded  to 


40  The   World  We  Live  In 

the  patriarchs  by  many  of  his  colleagues.  "They  wish  to 
prove,"  he  complained  to  me,  "that  Abraham  was  httle  better 
than  a  fetish-worshiper.  Now,  I  have  proved  conclusively 
that  he  was  a  worshiper  of  the  sun  and  moon ;  that  is,  an  idol- 
ater of  a  really  high  order." 

There  is  a  third  feature  of  Everybody's  World,  one  of  no  small 
importance,  that  Berkeley  felt  impelled  to  deny.  Men  gener- 
ally had  attributed,  as  they  still  attribute,  to  physical  things  a 
certain  continuous,  independent,  existence.  No  workman 
thinks  that  his  tools  are  annihilated  when  he  turns  his  back,  or 
that  they  are  preserved  merely  by  the  grace  of  God,  and  be- 
cause the  Divine  Eye  is  upon  them.  I  cannot  beheve  that  my 
garret  and  my  cellar  spring  into  being  alternately  as  I  travel 
up  and  down  the  stair ;  nor  can  I  be  persuaded  that,  to  have  a 
whole  house  at  once,  I  must  either  turn  theist,  or  distribute 
my  family  in  the  various  rooms  and  beg  my  neighbors  to  watch 
the  external  walls  and  the  chimneys. 

Should  one  here  raise  the  protest  that  it  is  unbecoming  to 
make  sport  of  a  man  of  undoubted  genius  and  of  noble  charac- 
ter, I  answer  :  I  am  not  making  sport  of  Berkeley,  in  the  least. 
I  love  the  man  ;  but  I  think  it  my  duty  to  point  out  so  clearly 
that  there  can  be  no  misunderstanding  in  the  matter  the 
truth  that  his  doctrine  is  not  in  harmony  with  common  sense, 
and  is  not  the  doctrine  of  the  man  of  science,  except  in  a  few  in- 
stances in  which  the  man  of  science  has  elected  to  try  his  luck 
as  a  metaphysician.  For  Berkeley  the  independence  of  the 
jihysical  system  of  things  does  not  exist  —  that  system  would 
be  snuffed  out  with  the  last  percipient,  as  the  picture  on  the 
screen  vanishes,  when  the  light  in  the  lantern  is  extinguished. 

How  widely  Berkeley's  world  differs  from  Everybody's 
World  will  appear  more  clearly  in  the  next  chapter.  Here  I 
wish  to  dwell  upon  certain  momentous  consequences  which 
follow  in  the  train  of  the  new  doctrine. 

Men  are  not  influenced  merely  by  the  dry  light  of  reason. 


The   World  as  Idea  41 

We  all  have  a  tendency  to  believe  what  we  like ;  recently,  there 
has  been  an  exacerbation  of  activity  among  those  who  would 
persuade  us  that  it  is  our  pleasant  duty  to  believe  what  we  like. 
The  doctrine  of  the  World  as  Idea  seemed  to  open  up  enchant- 
ing vistas.  Idealism  in  its  later  as  well  as  in  its  earlier  forms 
has  always  appealed  to  the  emotions  quite  as  much  as  to  the 
intellect ;  the  very  name  attracts  us,  and  tends  to  disarm  sus- 
picion. 

Literally  for  thousands  of  years  men  had  been  interested  in 
the  question  of  the  existence  and  attributes  of  God,  and  in  the 
problem  of  His  relation  to  the  world.  Men  had  offered  demon- 
strations of  the  existence  of  God,  which  convinced  some  per- 
sons for  a  while,  but  which  became  a  stone  of  stumbling  to  oth- 
ers. There  had  been  much  talk  of  potentiality  and  Actuality, 
of  contingent  being  and  Necessary  Being,  of  that  whose  essence 
does  not  imply  existence,  and  of  that  whose  very  Nature  includes 
Existence.  The  mass  of  mankind  had  paid  little  attention  to 
such  subtleties,  but  believed  in  God,  moved  by  early  training, 
religious  feeling,  and  the  one  argument  which  impressed  man 
long  before  Socrates  and  long  after  Berkeley  —  the  argument 
which  finds  in  the  system  of  things  as  a  whole  something  analo- 
gous to  the  evidences  of  mind  revealed  by  human  beings. 

In  the  passing  of  the  old  order,  is  the  new  philosophy  com- 
pelled to  content  itself  with  the  commonplace  probable  evidence 
which  has  always  appealed  to  men  generally?  Can  it  do  no 
more  than  hope,  trust,  and  search  anxiously  for  evidences  of 
mind  in  the  universe  ?  No  !  it  has  found  an  irresistible  weapon, 
a  magic  lance,  which  can  unhorse  at  one  thrust  the  grisly 
phantom  of  doubt.  Is  it  not  clear  that  nothing  exists  or  can 
exist  save  spirits  and  their  ideas  ?  To  be  at  all,  an  idea  must 
have  its  being  in  some  spirit.  As  sure,  then,  as  my  papers  exist 
when  I  have  laid  them  away ;  as  sure  as  my  chair  stands  here 
at  midnight,  God  exists.^  He  must  exist,  or  nothing  would  have 
any  continuous  existence ;  and  do  we  not  all  know  that  things 


42  The   World  We  Live  In 

do  have  a  continuous  existence  ?  It  would  be  too  absurd  to 
believe  the  contrary.     What  would  become  of  Nature  ? 

Nor  is  this  all.  Ideas  are  only  ideas ;  minds  can  beget  them 
and  obliterate  them;  the  ideas  themselves  can  do  nothing. 
They  passively  appear  and  disappear,  as  they  are  ordered  up 
and  dismissed.  If,  then,  any  change  whatever  takes  place  in 
ideas,  it  is  due  to  the  action  of  some  mind.  In  most  instances 
such  changes  cannot  be  attributed  to  the  finite  minds  which  we 
all  unhesitatingly  accept.  We  may,  therefore,  take  the  laws  of 
nature,  the  orderly  succession  of  the  ideas  of  sense,  to  be  the 
voice  of  God.  We  think  His  thoughts ;  we  share  with  Him  the 
imagery  in  His  Mind.^ 

It  only  remains  to  cap  the  edifice  of  the  idealistic  philosophy 
with  the  doctrine  of  the  natural  immortality  of  the  soul.^° 
Whatever  a  spirit  may  be,  it  is  not  an  idea,  nor  is  it  composed 
of  such.     Hence,  the  destruction  of  the  body  does  not  affect  it. 

Berkeley's  vision  is  gorgeous.  To  those  feeling  their  way 
an.xiously  in  a  world  foreign  to  them^  and  full  of  uncertainties  a 
light  is  gone  up.  Their  dead  and  doubtful  world  has  been 
transformed  into  a  revelation  of  God ;  and  a  revelation  so  im- 
mediate, implying  a  communion  so  intimate,  that  doubt  and 
fear  are  banished  —  the  restless  soul  finds  itself  at  home,  and  is 
at  rest. 

The  vision  is  gorgeous.  It  seems  a  sunset  splendor  on  which 
to  feast  the  eyes.  Can  it  last  ?  or  must  it  fade  ?  Does  it 
really  rest  upon  the  earth  ?  or  will  it  tremble  for  a  while  before 
us,  and  then  slowly  pale  into  common  cloud  ?  If  we  turn  with 
our  questions  to  the  philosopher  of  our  day,  it  is  hkely  that  he 
will  say  :  "What  you  saw,  when  in  the  company  of  Berkeley, 
is  not  real  just  as  you  saw  it."  But  he  may  add  :  "When  it 
fades,  however,  we  are  not  left  to  the  contemplation  of  common 
cloufl ;  follow  the  lead  of  the  modern  idealist  to  yonder  height, 
and  look  again." 

Berkeley  has  few  faithful  followers  to-day,  but  the  idealists 


The   World  as  Idea  43 

are  many.  It  may  be  asked  why,  in  depicting  the  World  as 
Idea,  I  have  turned  to  him  rather  than  to  some  one  of  those 
now  Hving. 

The  reason  is,  that  his  doctrine  is  really  and  unequivocally 
idealism.  In  his  writings  the  word  "idea"  has  not  yet  been 
disinfected,  deodorized,  freed  from  that  unmistakable  flavor  of 
the  subjective  which  gives  its  significance  to  the  distinction 
drawn  by  the  conimon  man  and  the  man  of  science  between 
"ideas"  and  "things."  For  many  centuries  the  philosophers 
had  recognized  the  distinction  and  accepted  both;  Berkeley 
had  kept  the  ideas  and  thrown  away  the  things,  but  ideas  meant 
to  him  much  the  same  that  they  had  meant  to  his  predecessors. 
It  was  precisely  the  fact  that  they  did  retain  this  meaning  that 
led  him  to  deny  certain  characteristics  of  Everybody's  World, 
and  to  conjure  up  the  vision  that  stirs  us  to  doubt  and  that  com- 
pels our  admiration. 

In  many  later  idealists  the  sharp  outlines  of  the  doctrine  have 
been  rubbed  away ;  contrasts  have  been  rendered  less  strik- 
ing. It  is  even  possible  to  dispute  over  the  question  whether 
certain  writers  are  idealists  at  all,  and  we  refuse  to  be  guided  in 
our  judgment  by  the  name  which  it  has  pleased  them  to  assume. 
Their  idealism  has  grown  old  and  stricken  in  words,  and  appears 
almost  ready  to  be  gathered  to  its  fathers.  It  is  true  that  even 
here  we  are  apt  to  find  something  of  the  old  emotional  uphft, 
a  trace  of  the  enthusiasm  which  arises  from  the  feehng  that  one 
is  fighting  in  a  good  cause  and  is  upholding  the  spirituality  of 
things.  But  to  the  critical  reader  the  ground  for  such  an 
enthusiasm  is  not  always  apparent.  The  light  has  been  fading 
from  the  enchanted  palace  ;  much  of  the  glow  has  left  it.  The 
mist  of  words  and  phrases  through  which  we  descry  with  diffi- 
culty the  outlines  of  the  dying  splendor  cannot  prevent  us  from 
having  occasional  glimpses  which  lead  us  to  believe  that  we  are, 
after  all,  standing  before  common  cloud. 

To  the  new  idealism  I  shall  return  later  in  this  book.     Here 


44  The   World  We  Live  In 

we  are  concerned  with  the  world-problem  and  its  solution 
through  the  assumption  that  the  World  is  Idea.  We  best 
further  our  aim  by  considering  the  aspect  that  our  world  takes 
on  if  we  regard  it  as  quite  unequivocally  idea.  To  Berkeley 
it  was  such  more  indisputably  than  to  many  of  those  who  came 
after  him.     It  is  just,  then,  to  begin  with  Berkeley. 


CHAPTER  IV 

THE   UNREALITY   OF   THE   WORLD  AS  IDEA 

It  is  giving  the  physical  world  a  bad  name  to  call  it  Idea. 
If  we  mean  nothing  at  all  by  the  word,  it  is  stupid  to  use  it, 
for  we  only  embarrass  thereby  our  intercourse  with  our  fellows. 
If  we  mean  what  general  usage  since  the  middle  of  the  sixteenth 
century  justifies  us  in  meaning,  we  talk  about  the  choir  of 
heaven  and  furniture  of  the  earth  in  a  way  that  sensible  men 
both  learned  and  unlearned  must  regard  as  ill-advised  and  irre- 
sponsible. 

When  we  speak  to-day,  in  the  street,  of  sensations  and  ideas, 
we  are  not  supposed  to  be  making  insignificant  noises.  It  is 
assumed  that  we  mean  something,  and  if  our  words  are  used 
inappropriately,  men  are  impelled  to  protest.  Thus,  he  who 
would  talk  of  eating  and  drinking  ideas,  taking  sensations  out  of 
his  purse,  inserting  an  emotion  into  a  keyhole,  or  heaping  a 
platter  with  ripe  reflections,  would  be  regarded  as  either  un- 
seasonably merry  or  the  victim  of  nervous  disorder. 

Passing  from  the  street  into  the  psychological  laboratory,  we 
find  that  reckless  speech  is  frowned  upon  in  just  the  same  way. 
Certain  things  we  may  say  about  sensations  and  ideas,  and 
certam  things  we  may  not  say.  It  is  accepted  on  all  hands  that 
we  may  not  speak  of  things  psychical  as  we  naturally  speak  of 
things  physical.  The  student  ordered  to  set  up  the  idea  of  his 
apparatus,  and  fetch  from  the  shelf  the  percepts  of  colored  disks, 
might  not  unnaturally  expect  his  next  task  to  be  the  gathering 
up  with  a  dustbrash  of  valuable  hints  dropped  by  his  professor 
during  the  last  lecture. 

Now,  it  is  not  a  whit  less  inappropriate  to  treat  physical 

45 


46  The   World  We  Live  In 

things  as  psychical  than  it  is  to  treat  what  is  psychical  as 
physical.  If,  on  the  street,  I  give  a  man  a  gold  piece  and  tell 
him  to  put  it  away  carefully  in  his  mind,  he  assumes  that  I 
have  presented  him  with  both  a  coin  and  a  jest.  If,  in  the 
laboratory,  I  say  :  close  your  eyes,  and  turn  that  dynamometer 
into  a  memory-image ;  put  this  speck  under  the  microscope,  and 
convert  it  into  an  insect ;  that  cork  is  too  large,  stand  farther 
back  from  it  and  reduce  its  size;  —  if  I  ramble  on  in  this 
fashion,  it  will  be  suspected  that  I  have  dined  generously. 
Neither  in  common  life  nor  in  the  sciences  is  it  permissible 
to  name  things  arbitrarily  and  to  talk  of  them  incoherently. 

To  the  philosopher  more  latitude  is  granted.  So  much  of 
what  he  says  is  incomprehensible  to  most  persons  in  any  case, 
and  the  difficulties  of  reflective  thought  are  admittedly  so  great, 
that  men  are,  on  the  whole,  disposed  to  excuse  him  for  utter- 
ances which  do  not  seem  in  harmony  with  good  sense.  He  leads 
us  into  a  new  and  unfamiliar  world ;  we  hesitate  to  apply  to 
what  we  find  there  the  standard  weights  and  measures  to  which 
we  are  accustomed. 

And  yet,  it  does  seem  a  doubtful  compliment  to  the  philos- 
opher to  set  him  apart  from  other  men,  and  to  treat  him  as 
irresponsible,  even  out  of  deep  respect.  The  old  saying,  ''The 
king  can  do  no  wrong,"  carries  with  it  a  sting.  It  docs  not 
maintain  that  the  king  does  right ;  it  makes  of  him  a  venerable 
and  privileged  outlaw.  Since  Berkeley's  time,  many  philos- 
ophers have  taken  the  liberty  of  talking  as  though  houses, 
rivers,  and  mountains  were  something  psychical ;  and,  as  we 
have  all  gotten  used  to  the  doctrine,  there  is  no  great  outcry 
against  them,  though  the  plain  man  goes  on  believing  that 
they  are  not  psychical,  the  man  of  science  never  dreams  of 
treating  them  as  though  they  were  psychical,  and  an  occa- 
sional philosopher  raises  his  voice  in  protest. 

It  may  be  objected  that  I  wrong  Berkeley  and  his  succes- 
sors in  classing  them  with  those  who  confuse  physical  and  psy- 


The   Unreality  of  the   World  as  Idea  47 

chical  after  the  fashion  illustrated  above.  There  are  those 
who  assert  strenuously  that  Berkeley  meant  by  his  ideas  of 
sense  precisely  what  men  generally  mican  by  physical  things. 
I  think  enough  has  been  said  in  the  preceding  chapter  to  prove 
that  this  is  not  the  case,  but  the  point  is  one  of  such  importance 
that  it  is  worth  while  to  dwell  upon  it  at  some  length. 

Let  us,  then,  consider  what  sense-ideas  did  and  did  not  mean 
to  Berkeley.  It  is  quite  certain,  to  begin  with,  that  he  did  not 
think  of  the  things  revealed  to  sight  and  touch  as  being  Httle 
images  in  his  head.  To  him  the  table  on  which  he  wrote  was 
the  table  in  his  study ;  it  was  in  front  of  his  body,  not  in  it. 
His  body  was  an  idea,  like  the  table ;  and  he  would  as  soon 
have  thought  of  putting  his  body  into  the  table  as  of  putting 
that  bit  of  furniture  into  his  body.  The  things  he  saw  and  felt 
did  not  shrivel  up  and  change  their  places  as  soon  as  they  were 
baptized  "idea." 

Nevertheless,  something  did  happen  to  them.  They  did 
not  remain  the  "things"  of  common  thought  and  of  science. 
They  were  seen  under  a  new  aspect,  revealed  in  a  novel  charac- 
ter. It  was  not  mere  accident  that  they  were  called  ideas. 
The  name  was  given  to  them  because  Berkeley  believed  that  he 
had  made  a  discovery  of  no  small  significance  touching  their 
real  nature.  The  traditional  sense  of  such  words  as  "idea" 
and  "sensation"  makes  them  subjective  phenomena,  a  some- 
thing referred  to  this  or  that  disposition  of  our  body ;  a  spark 
struck  out  when  our  body  is  acted  on  by  other  bodies,  or  the 
after-image,  so  to  speak,  of  such  a  spark  —  a  something  inter- 
mittent, coming  and  going  as  it  is  begotten  of  the  passing  mo- 
ment or  annihilated  with  it.  It  was  believed  in  Berkeley's 
day,  as  it  is  beheved  in  ours,  that  our  bodies  and  the  other 
bodies  which  act  upon  it  stand  in  sharp  contrast  to  such  fugitive 
and  merely  representative  existences. 

Berkeley  obliterates  this  distinction.  He  does  not  turn 
ideas  into  tilings,  but  he  does  turn  things  into  ideas ;  that  is  to 


48  The   World  We  Live  In 

say,  he  thinks  and  speaks  of  the  physical  as  though  it  were  some- 
thing psychicah  The  houses,  mountains,  and  rivers  that  he 
calls  ideas  he  conceives  to  be  "imprinted  on  the  sense."  ^ 

Would  any  man  in  the  street,  would  any  man  in  the  labora- 
tory, ever  speak  of  a  mountain  as  "imprinted  on  the  sense"? 
He  might  speak  of  it  as  imprinting  something,  but  surely  he 
would  not  think  of  it  as  the  impression.  Berkeley  has  given 
up  the  time-honored  attempt  to  explain  appearances  by  the 
action  of  objects  upon  the  organ  of  sense,  and  the  coming  into 
being  of  corresponding  ideas;  but  he  has  not  given  it  up 
utterly  and  wholly.  If  he  had  done  so,  he  would  not  have 
talked  of  "impressions"  at  all,  and  he  would  not  have  called 
material  things  "ideas."  His  material  things  are  transformed; 
they  really  have  the  ear-marks  of  old-fashioned  ideas. 

We  see  this  clearly  in  the  denial  of  the  independent  existence 
of  physical  things  discussed  in  the  last  chapter.     It  is  argued 
that  such  objects  are  only  ideas,  and,  hence,  their  very  existence 
must  depend  on  their  being  perceived.     How  seriously  Berke- 
ley took  this  appears  from  his  answer  to  the  objection  that,  on 
his  principles,  tilings  are  at  every  moment  annihilated  and 
created  anew.^     Had  he  not  unequivocally  turned  things  into 
ideas,  and  robbed  them  of  the  character  attributed  to  them  by 
his  predecessors  and  by  most  of  us  at  the  present  day,  it  would 
have  been  easy  for  him  to  say:   "Things  are  not  annihilated 
and  created  anew ;  they  disappear  when  we  close  our  eyes,  and 
whenwe  open  them,  they  appear  again.     There  is  all  the  differ- 
ence in  the  world  between  disappearance  and  annihilation." 
He  could  then  have  tried  to  make  clear  what  is  meant  by  the 
existence  of  a  physical  thing  as  distinguished  from  its  being 
perceived,  and  to  show  in  what  sense  things  are  independent  of 
perception.     This  cannot  be  a  hopeless  task,  for  men  draw 
the  distinction  every  day,  and  both  in  common  life  and  in 
science  profitable  use  is  made  of  it. 

But  Berkeley  could  not  do  this.     He  is  reduced  to  bom- 


The   Unreality  of  the   World  as  Idea  49 

barcling  his  opponent  with  a  curious  assortment  of  answers 
better  calculated  to  silence  him  than  to  convince  him.  Thus, 
the  objector  is  informed  that,  since  to  exist  has  no  other  mean- 
ing than  to  be  perceived,  it  is  not  reasonable  for  him  "  to  stand 
up  in  defense  of  he  knows  not  what."  He  is  told  that  even 
those  who  believe  in  a  world  of  things  distinct  from  ideas 
admit  that  light  and  colors,  and,  hence,  what  is  immediately 
perceived  by  sight,  can  only  exist  so  long  as  the  sensations  are 
perceived.  It  is  pointed  out  that  the  Schoolmen,  who  ac- 
cepted a  material  world,  made  it  so  dependent  on  God,  that 
they  conceived  of  its  existence  as  a  continual  creation.  It  is 
insisted  that  even  the  "materialists"  do  not  believe  that  what 
exists  outside  the  mind  is  identical  with  what  we  immediately 
perceive,  and  ought,  therefore,  to  admit  that  what  we  per- 
ceive by  sense  exists  only  in  the  mind.  So  far,  the  conclusion 
indicated  seems  to  be,  that  it  would  be  nothing  to  make  a 
coil  about  even  if  things  were  constantly  annihilated  and 
re-created. 

This  is  clever.  We  are  reduced  to  a  condition  of  becoming 
humility,  and  brought  to  that  frame  of  mind  in  which  we  would 
gladly  accept  a  continuously  existent  world  of  any  sort. 
When  he  has  us  on  our  knees,  Berkeley  offers  us  one.  "Wher- 
ever bodies  are  said  to  have  no  existence  without  the  mind," 
he  explains  to  us,  "I  would  not  be  understood  to  mean  this  or 
that  particular  mind,  but  all  minds  whatsoever.  It  does  not 
therefore  follow  from  the  foregoing  principles  that  bodies 
are  annihilated  and  created  every  moment,  or  exist  not  at  all 
during  the  intervals  between  our  perception  of  them." 

The  enormity  of  Berkeley's  offense  against  the  external  world 
impresses  us  more  and  more  as  we  reflect  upon  it.  What  a 
beggarly  continuity  of  existence  is  that  which  he  offers  us  ! 
The  first  shock  experienced  upon  hearing  that  physical  things 
are  ideas,  a  shock  from  which  we  had  begun  to  recover  on 
being  assured  that  nothing  real  is  banished  out  of  nature,  is 


50  \        The   World  We  Live  In 

followed  by  a  second  quite  as  severe,  when  we  realize  that  he 
means  by  bodies  nothing  more  than  the  percepts  existing  in 
some  mind  or  other,  or  the  copies  of  such  in  the  imagination. 

Let  us  put  the  matter  to  the  test  in  a  concrete  instance.  I 
am  sitting  at  my  table,  and  my  friend  is  seated  in  the  easy- 
chair  on  the  other  side  of  it.  I  have  occasion  to  go  into  the 
next  room  to  get  a  book.  Is  it  sober  good  sense  to  believe  that 
he  can  hold  my  table  down  for  me,  during  my  absence,  and  can 
give  it  a  continuous  existence  ?  Remember  that,  by  hypothe- 
sis, the  table,  as  distinct  from  his  percept  and  mine,  and  the 
percepts  of  other  possible  sentient  beings,  does  not  exist.  What 
is  "imprinted  on  the  sense,"  in  his  case,  is  not  identical  with 
what  is  "imprinted  on  the  sense"  so  far  as  I  am  concerned. 
He  may  hold  on  to  his  percept,  but  he  never  had  mine,  and  he 
cannot  hold  on  to  that.  In  common  speech  we  say  "  the  table  " 
as  though  there  were  no  difference  between  his  experience  and 
mine ;  but  that  is  because  we  accept  the  distinction  current 
in  Everybody's  World  between  the  table  and  our  percepts  or 
ideas  of  the  table.  Let  us  drop  the  distinction,  in  the  spirit  of 
the  new  philosophy,  and  let  us  consistently  keep  to  ideas.  Are 
we  to  assume  that  any  percept  of  a  table  enjoyed  by  any  single 
percipient  creature  can  give  continuous  existence  of  some  sort 
to  all  conceivable  ex-periences  of  a  table  which  may  be  enjoyed 
by  all  possible  animated  beings  ?  This  seems  arbitrary  in  the 
extreme.  Moreover,  what  is  this  talk  of  handing  ideas  about, 
as  if  they  were  specie  taken  out  of  one  pocket  and  dropped  into 
another?  Is  it  not  abhorrent  to  nature  to  speak  of  com- 
mitting my  ideas  to  the  safekeeping  of  an  acquaintance  when  I 
am  too  much  occupied  to  keep  an  eye  on  them  myself  ? 

We  are  not  concerned  only  with  a  question  of  verbal  usage. 
The  popular  outcry  against  Berkeley  was  not  without  its  rela- 
tive justification.  No  man  seriously  believes  that  the  con- 
tinuous existence  of  my  table  is  assured,  if  I  will  but  induce 
my  friend  to  remain  in  my  room  until  I  return  to  it.     We  are 


The   Unreality  of  the   World  as  Idea  51 

convinced  that  his  seeing  the  table  adds  nothing  to  its  real 
existence ;  we  feel  sure  that  his  closing  his  eyes  detracts  nothing 
from  it.  We  mean  by  the  table  and  its  real  existence  something 
else  than  the  sporadic  appearance,  in  this  or  that  mind,  of  this 
or  that  percept,  and  the  continued  existence,  in  one  conscious- 
ness, of  an  idea,  when  some  corresponding  idea  has  disappeared 
from  another. 

But  what  aspect  does  the  problem  take  on  when  we  bring 
in  the  notion  of  a  Divine  Mind  ?  It  seems  a  simple  matter  to 
say  that  "the  things  of  sense"  exist  in  the  mind  of  God  during 
the  intervals  of  our  perception  of  them,  and,  thus,  may  come 
back  again  into  our  experience.  This  appears  to  be  doing  no 
more  than  finding  a  place  for  the  external  world  as  the  plain 
man  conceives  the  external  world.  When,  however,  we  bear  in 
mind  that  sensible  things  are  supposed  to  be  nothing  else  than 
sensations  or  ideas,  we  are  impelled  to  ask  ourselves:  Do  all  the 
sensations  or  ideas  which  any  sentient  creature  has  ever  had 
in  connection  with  this  table  exist  actually  and  continuously  in 
some  Infinite  Mind  ?  and  is  it  the  permanent  existence  of  this 
frightful  thicket  of  inconsistent  experiences  that  we  mean  by 
the  continued  existence  of  the  table,  and  that  we  regard  as  the 
explanation  of  our  seeing  the  table  again  when  we  open  our 
eyes ?  Surely,  when  I  say :  "I  believe  my  table  is  still  in  the 
next  room,"  I  do  not  mean  that  God  has  an  idea,  or  a  collection 
of  such,  any  more  than  I  mean  that  a  particular  man  has  an 
idea.  On  returning  to  the  room,  I  do  not  perceive  the  other 
man's  impression  or  idea ;  I  infer  that  he  has  one,  because  I 
see  him  and  the  table.  And  if  by  ideas  we  really  mean  ideas, 
and  by  God's  Mind  we  really  mean  a  mind  in  any  unequivocal 
sense  of  the  word,  it  is  as  absurd  to  say  that  the  table  which  I 
now  see  is  an  idea  in  the  Divine  Mind  as  to  say  that  it  is  an  idea 
in  that  of  some  other  man.  Both  the  plain  man  and  the  psy- 
chologist know  very  well  that  the  contents  of  other  minds  are 
not  thus  directly  revealed  to  us  at  all.     One  must  be  far  gone 


52 


The   World  We  Live  In 


in  metaphysics,  and  an  adept  at  the  art  of  loose  and  vague  ex- 
pression, to  conceive  of  the  things  that  we  see  and  feel  as  being 
someone's  else  impressions  or  ideas,  and  to  succeed  in  per- 
suading others  that  such  a  behef  is  reasonable.  As  to  the 
Hteral  transfer  of  ideas  from  an  infinite  mind  to  a  finite,  it  is 
neither  more  nor  less  absurd  than  the  Hteral  transfer  of  one 
man's  sensations  to  another  man. 

No,  the  continuous  existence  which  Berkeley  attributes  to 
physical  things  is  a  beggarly  existence  —  a  patchwork  psychical 
existence.  How  are  we  to  explain  his  contenting  himself 
with  this  ?  We  can  only  explain  it  by  holding  clearly  in  mind 
two  things :  First,  that,  in  accordance  with  tradition,  he  felt 
compelled  to  assume  that  everything  we  can  perceive  directly 
is  Idea  ;  and,  second,  that  he  was  a  sensible  man  and  was  well 
aware  that  he  had  no  right  to  mutilate  Everybody's  World 
beyond  recognition. 

In  Everybody's  World,  in  common  life  and  in  science,  it  is 
taken  for  granted  that,  although  ideas  are  fugitive  existences 
and  come  and  go  in  ways  which  have  to  be  accounted  for, 
nevertheless  physical  things  exist  continuously  and  go  through 
their  changes  whether  we  do  or  do  not  perceive  them.  Berkeley 
was  not  uninfluenced  by  this  feature  of  Everybody's  World. 
He  assumed,  as  a  natural  conviction,  the  permanence  of  sen- 
sible things,  and  he  then  set  himself  to  work  to  give,  within  the 
frame  furnished  by  the  notion  that  the  things  we  see  and  feel 
are  ideas  and  nothing  else,  some  intelligible  account  of  it.  In 
the  second  of  the  "Dialogues  between  Hylas  and  Philonous," 
he  says  that  men  commonly  believe  that  all  things  are  per- 
ceived by  God,  because  they  believe  in  the  existence  of  God. 
He,  on  his  part,  infers  the  existence  of  God,  because  all  sensible 
things  must  be  perceived  by  Him. 

Thus,  the  permanence  of  the  things  perceived  by  sense 
comes  first.  It  is  simply  assumed.  And,  as  it  is  further  as- 
sumed that  the  things  in  question  are  ideas,  it  seems  to  follow 


The   Unreality  of  the   World  as  Idea  53 

that,  to  exist,  they  must  exist  in  some  mind.  It  appears,  then, 
that  our  ideahst  could  not  help  accepting  "things"  very  much 
as  we  all  do,  but  he  was  forced  to  view  these  "things"  under  a 
new  and  a  strange  light.  They  became  to  him  ideas,  continu- 
ously existing,  but  in  no  sense  independent ;  real  things  that 
were  not  quite  real,  or  quite  capable  of  constituting  a  real 
physical  world ;  things  that  had  to  board  around,  hke  a  coun- 
try schoolmaster  in  the  days  of  our  fathers,  passing  their  time 
now  in  this  mind,  now  in  that ;  passive  things,  unable  to  act 
and  react  among  themselves,  never  physical  causes  and  effects ; 
things  of  too  little  consideration  to  be  set  up  as  gods  by  the 
enhghtened  idolater,  as  Berkeley,  in  his  theological  zeal,  takes 
the  trouble  expressly  to  point  out.^ 

There  can  be  no  question  that  things  have  lost  by  passing 
through  Berkeley's  hands.  They  are  no  longer  the  things  of 
common  thought  and  of  science.  The  vision  in  the  cloud  has 
been  bought  dear  —  it  has  cost  us  a  real  physical  world,  and  has 
substituted  for  it  something  unreal  and  fantastic,  a  something 
whose  stabihty  and  permanence  is  of  a  highly  questionable 
kind.  Berkeley  thinks  and  speaks  of  physical  things  as  it  is 
not  permissible  to  think  and  speak  of  them  on  the  street  and  in 
the  laboratory.  If  we  enter  no  objection,  it  is  because,  he 
being  a  philosopher,  we  do  not  care  much  what  he  says,  and  we 
do  not  judge  him  as  we  judge  other  men. 

Can  the  doctrine  of  the  World  as  Idea  be  made  more  reason- 
able without  being  wholly  done  away  with?  It  really  does 
seem  too  absurd  to  say  that,  when  I  step  out  of  my  room,  I 
leave  behind  the  sensations  which  I  had  while  there,  that  these 
continue  to  exist,  and  that  I  can  pick  them  up  again  on  my 
return.  But  may  I  not,  while  holding  to  Berkeley's  funda- 
mental thesis  that  all  existence  must  be  psychical  existence, 
try  to  avoid  this  unnatural  preservation  of  sensations  or  ideas, 
and  their  incomprehensible  transfer  from  mind  to  mind? 
In  a  pregnant  sentence,  the  significance  of  which  Berkeley 


54  TJie   World  We  Live  In 

himself  appears  little  to  have  realized,  he  says:  "The  table  I 
write  on  I  say  exists,  that  is,  I  see  and  feel  it ;  and  if  I  were 
out  of  my  study  I  should  say  it  existed  —  meaning  thereby 
that  if  I  was  in  my  study  I  might  perceive  it,  or  that  some 
other  spirit  actually  does  perceive  it."  ^ 

It  seems,  then,  that  I  may  speak  of  a  thing  as  existing  either 
when  I  actually  perceive  it,  or  when  I  know  that,  under  certain 
conditions,  I  can  perceive  it.  In  the  mind  of  John  Stuart  Mill 
this  thought  developed  into  the  theory  that  material  things 
are  "permanent  possibilities  of  sensation."  ^  According  to  this 
doctrine,  in  saying  that  furniture  exists  in  the  next  room  al- 
though no  one  is  there,  I  do  not  mean  that  sensations  exist ;  I 
mean  that  permanent  possibilities  of  sensation  exist. 

To  the  man  discontented  with  Berkeley's  doctrine  this  may 
seem,  at  first  sight,  something  of  an  improvement.  The  com- 
mon sense  distinction  between  sensations  and  things  appears 
to  be  retained,  and  sensations  are  regarded  as  fugitive,  while 
things  are  treated  as  continuously  existing.  But  a  little  careful 
scrutiny  reveals,  in  the  first  place,  that  any  plausibiUty  which 
attaches  to  Mill's  view  arises  out  of  the  fact  that  he  has  made 
it  easier  for  himself  and  for  us  to  slip  unawares  into  the  com- 
mon sense  doctrine,  accepting  a  world  of  physical  things  as 
do  the  plain  man  and  the  man  of  science ;  and  reveals,  in  the 
second  place,  that  Mill  has  not  at  all  given  us  information  as  to 
what  things  are  —  he  has  merely  pointed  out  to  us  what  may 
be  expected  to  happen  if  things  do  exist.  I  must  dilate  for 
a  moment  upon  these  two  points. 

As  for  the  first.  Let  us  go  back  to  the  philosophers  dis- 
cussed in  Chapter  II,  and  let  us  ask  whether  there  would  be 
anything  unnatural  in  their  describing  things  as  possibilities 
of  sensation.  Empedocles,  Democritus,  Plato,  Aristotle,  the 
Schoolmen,  Locke,  and  the  rest,  might  very  well  have  spoken 
thus.  Even  the  Skeptic  could  have  called  things  unknown 
possibilities   of   sensation.     Was   there   not   supposed   to   be 


The   Unreality  of  the   World  as  Idea  55 

something  to  which  sensations  could  be  attributed?  Some 
beheved  that  they  knew  a  good  deal  about  this  something,  and 
some  believed  that  they  knew  very  little,  but  all  accepted  it, 
and  referred  sensations  to  it  in  one  way  or  in  another.  To  be 
sure,  a  good  many  of  these  thinkers  would  have  maintained,  if 
questioned,  that,  in  saying  that  things  give  rise  to  sensations, 
we  have  not  said  about  them  all  that  we  are  justified  in  saying. 
But  they  could  have  agreed  in  saying  so  much,  and  in  calling 
the  things  permanent  as  compared  with  the  sensations. 

Now,  Berkeley  threw  away  these  things,  as  we  have  seen, 
and  tried  to  make  his  world  out  of  sensations.  Mill  made  a 
feint  of  throwing  them  away,  but  he  really  brought  them  back 
again  under  another  name.  It  is  a  very  instructive  fact  that 
in  his  famous  "System  of  Logic,"  where  he  is  not  quarrehng 
with  Sir  Wilham  Hamilton,  but  is  trying  to  give  a  serious  and 
scientific  account  of  the  world  we  live  in,  he  finds  it  necessary 
to  give  the  following  enumeration  of  all  Namable  Things :  ^ — 

1.  Feelings,  or  States  of  Consciousness. 

2.  The  Minds  which  experience  those  feelings. 

3.  The  Bodies,  or  external  objects,  which  excite  certain  of 
those  feelings,  together  with  the  powers  or  properties  whereby 
they  excite  them. 

4.  The  Successions  and  Coexistences,  the  Likenesses  and 
Unlikenesses,  between  feehngs. 

Mill  apologizes,  it  is  true,  for  the  introduction  of  the  third 
class,  and  calls  it  a  concession  to  common  opinion.  But  I  affirm 
without  hesitation  that  his  book  could  not  have  been  written  if 
he  had  consistently  excluded  it.  His  main  interest  was  not  psy- 
chological, but  lay  in  the  attempt  to  investigate  the  methods  by 
v/hich  the  laws  of  nature  are  discovered.  He  could  not  dispense 
with  a  system  of  nature,  and  he  does  not  even  try  to  do  so. 

Let  us,  however,  pretend  that  he  is  a  serious  follower  of 
Berkeley,  and  that,  when  he  says  that  something  exists  in  the 
next  room,  he  really  means  only  that  he  could  have  had  sensa- 


56  The  World  We  Live  In 

tions  which  he  has  not  had,  and  that  he  may  have  sensations 
which  he  has  not.  He  is  sitting  and  writing.  He  hears  a  clock 
strike.  How  shall  he  account  for  what  he  hears?  There  is 
no  clock  in  the  room.  May  he  say,  "The  law  of  causality 
demands  that  I  assume  'the  fact  that  I  might  have  had,  or 
may  have,  certain  sensations'  to  be  the  cause  of  the  sensations 
which  I  actually  have"  ? 

What  sort  of  a  world  is  this  ?  What  becomes  of  the  clock 
situated  in  space  at  a  certain  distance  from  Mill's  body, 
with  its  wheels  revolving,  its  hammer  striking?  What  be- 
comes of  the  sound  waves  supposed  to  set  an  actually  existent 
sense-organ  in  motion  and,  thus,  to  give  rise  to  sensation  ? 
The  whole  apparatus  disappears.  We  cannot  construct  a 
world  out  of  "might  have  been's"  and  "may  he's";  and  a 
physical  world  constructed  out  of  psychical  "might  have 
been's"  and  "may  he's,"  i.e.  out  of  possible  sensations,  is  as 
absurd  as  a  complex  of  sensations  made  up  of  physical  possi- 
bilities. Mill's  world  is  even  more  unreal  than  Berkeley's ; 
but,  as  it  is  so  easy  to  slip  from  it  into  the  world  of  common 
sense,  turning  "possibihties  of  sensation"  into  things,  one  con- 
fuses the  two,  and  one  does  not  realize  how  poor  and  unreal  a 
thing  it  is. 

And  now  for  the  second  point.  It  is  the  common  opinion 
of  mankind  that,  if  a  given  physical  thing  exists,  it  can,  under 
appropriate  conditions,  be  perceived  by  beings  that  have  the 
proper  organs  of  sense.  But  it  is  held  with  equal  conviction 
that  it  may  enter  into  a  multitude  of  other  and  very  different 
relations.  Thus,  a  potato  can  be  perceived.  A  potato  that  can- 
not conceivably  be  perceived  is  no  potato  ;  that  is,  it  does  not 
exist.  A  potato,  however,  may  also  be  buried  in  the  ground, 
or  may  be  boiled.  A  potato  that  cannot  conceivably  be 
buried  or  boiled  is  just  as  certainly  no  potato  ;  it  does  not  exist. 

We  have  seen  that  Mill  distinguished  between  sensations  and 
things  somewhat  as  other  men  do,  and  that  he  regarded  the 


The   Unreality  of  the   World  as  Idea  57 

sensations  as  fugitive  and  the  things  as  permanent.  But, 
in  making  the  being  of  things  to  be  nothing  else  than  "possi- 
bility of  sensation,"  he  departs  enormously  from  the  treatment 
accorded  to  things  in  common  thought  and  in  science,  and  ig- 
nores everything  save  the  one  relation.  Why  did  he  cling  to 
"possibility  of  sensation"  rather  than  to  "possibihty  of  being 
buried"  or  "possibihty  of  being  boiled"  ?  Are  such  physical 
relations  not  equally  essential  ? 

The  explanation  of  his  attitude  —  the  explanation  of  the 
attitude  of  every  subjectivist,  whatever  his  particular  shade 
of  opinion  —  is  to  be  found  in  the  development  of  thought 
recorded  in  the  two  chapters  preceding.  Men  attempt  to 
account  for  appearances  by  distinguishing  between  appear- 
ances and  things;  they  conceive  of  things  as  transmitting  to 
the  mind  copies  or  representatives  of  themselves ;  they  con- 
clude that  the  representatives  are  more  directly  known  than 
the  things ;  they  doubt  whether  there  really  are  such  things 
as  men  have  supposed,  and  they  decide  to  repudiate  them ; 
they  find  on  their  hands  sensations  or  ideas  and  nothing  else. 

The  physical  things  of  common  thought  and  of  science 
disappear  under  such  treatment,  and  physical  relations  proper 
disappear  with  them.  Perhaps  I  had  better  say,  physical 
things  'would  disappear,  if  they  had  the  least  self-respect.  If,  in 
spite  of  the  fact  that  they  are  refused  recognition,  they  come 
creeping  back  and  peep  in  at  the  door,  it  is  little  wonder  that 
they  disguise  themselves  as  possibilities  of  sensation.  Their 
only  hope  of  admission  hes  in  their  having  it  supposed  that  they 
can  estabhsh  some  sort  of  a  relationship  to  a  family  accepted 
as  of  good  standing.  It  should  not  be  overlooked,  however, 
that,  in  coming  back  in  their  capacity  as  relatives  merely,  they 
have  lost  all  their  usefulness  as  physical  things  which  may 
serve  as  an  explanation  of  appearances.  When  I  send  for 
the  plumber,  I  have  a  right  to  be  disappointed  if  he  presents 
himself  only  in  his  capacity  as  a  father. 


58  The   World  We  Live  In 

It  is  quite  as  important  in  our  day  as  it  was  in  the  days  of 
Berkeley  and  in  the  days  of  Mill  to  dwell  upon  the  unreaHty  of 
the  World  as  Idea.  Men  still  talk  of  the  physical  as  though 
it  were  something  psychical,  and  they  sublimate  their  material 
world  into  a  mere  phantasm.  It  is  true  that  neither  on  the 
street  nor  in  the  laboratory  do  men  permit  themselves  such 
hberties.  But  there  are  scientists  who  manage  to  enjoy  a 
Jekyll-Hyde  existence,  and  who,  during  their  irruptions  into 
philosophy,  feel  free  to  throw  off  all  restraint. 

Thus,  it  is  to  be  presumed  that  Professor  Mach,  who  was 
once  a  physicist,  was  accustomed  to  treat  the  apparatus  in  his 
laboratory  as  physical  and  talk  about  it  as  did  his  colleagues. 
Becoming  a  philosopher,  he  tells  us  that  physical  things  are 
composed  of  sensations.^  And  Professor  Pearson,  whose  spe- 
cial field  is  mechanics,  informs  us,^  when  he  philosophizes,  that 
external  things  are  sense-impressions,  really  inside  ourselves, 
but  which  we  "project"  without.  Shade  of  Aristotle,  remind 
us  again  that,  if  everything  is  sensation,  there  can  be  no  such 
thing  as  sensation,  for  there  is  really  no  such  thing  as  sense. 
Can  any  conceivable  thing  be,  even  to  a  philosopher,  composed 
wholly  of  "inside"  ?  How  real  is  a  world  composed  of  sense- 
impressions  which  we  throw  out,  and  yet  do  not  precisely  throw 
out,  since  they  remain  within  ?  Let  us,  without  more  ado,  all 
sit  upon  our  right ;  and  let  every  post  consist  wholly  of  its  own 
upper  end  ! 

"But,"  I  think  I  hear  it  insisted,  "such  crudities  of  expres- 
sion are  not  usually  to  be  attributed  to  those  who  have  entered 
the  philosophic  fold  through  the  door.  May  a  man  not  hold 
that  the  World  is  Idea,  in  some  sense,  and  yet  not  demolish  the 
world?"  I  answer:  if  by  sensation  one  does  not  precisely 
mean  sensation  ;  if  by  idea  one  does  not  precisely  mean  idea ; 
if  these  words  are  made  to  cover  something  really  external,  not 
conceived  of  as  the  content  of  any  mind,  not  a  "possibility," 
not  a  "projection"  —  then,  of  course,  one  may  call  the  world 


The   Unreality  of  the   World  as  Idea  59 

sensation  or  idea  without  treating  it  as  those  have  done  whom 
I  have  discussed  in  this  chapter.  But  it  does  not  seem  unfair 
to  ask  those  who  Hke  to  use  such  words  in  a  sense  contrary  to 
the  common  one,  and  who  call  themselves  idealists,  while  de- 
parting widely  from  the  views  of  Berkeley  and  Mill,  whether 
there  does  not  lurk  a  danger  in  the  very  diction  that  they 
employ  ?  Certainly  there  is  some  danger  of  misleading  others ; 
it  is  not  inconceivable  that  they  deceive  themselves.  May  it 
not  be  that  they  have  become  realists  of  a  certain  kind  —  let 
us  say,  enlightened  realists  ?  or,  perhaps,  enlightened  realists 
with  an  ideahstic  emotional  tinge  ?  I  leave  the  question  for 
the  present,  merely  stating  that  the  World  as  Idea  is  an  unreal 
and  phantom  world,  if  we  take  the  word  "idea"  in  its  traditional 
and  usual  sense.  The  right  of  the  philosopher  to  create  out 
of  common  words  a  language  of  his  own  seems  fairly  open  to 
dispute.^ 


CHAPTER   V 

THE   WORLD   AS   IDEA  AND   THE   RELUCTANT  ^\^:TNESS 

When  a  man  attains  to  a  certain  degree  of  eminence,  every- 
thing concerning  him  becomes  of  importance  to  a  vast  number 
of  persons.  Along  with  what  is  really  valuable  in  the  writings 
of  Goethe  and  Schiller,  we  treasure  casual  remarks  and 
trite  aphorisms  to  which  we  should  pay  small  attention  were 
they  not  coupled  with  a  great  name ;  we  collect  them  into  little 
books  bound  in  vellum,  and  we  present  them  to  our  friends  at 
the  turning  of  the  year.  Napoleon's  insignificant  comment 
on  the  tower  of  the  Antwerp  cathedral  finds  its  way  into  the 
guidebooks.  The  problem  whether  a  given  Elizabethan  dram- 
atist did  or  did  not  dine  with  another  notable  person  of  a  June 
day  in  some  year  of  our  Lord  or  other  is  thought  a  proper  sub- 
ject for  scientific  research.  We  treasure  scraps  of  letters, 
often  of  no  ascertainable  importance  either  to  literature  or  to 
science,  provided  they  are  traceable  to  a  famous  pen ;  and  our 
comment  upon  their  contents  is  inspired  by  a  Uvely  interest  and 
colored  with  a  genial  good  will.  And  when  what  a  man  of 
estabhshed  fame  says  really  is  of  some  importance,  his  utter- 
ance carries  with  it  a  weight  of  authority  out  of  all  proportion 
to  the  groundwork  of  argument  upon  wliich  it  is  based. 

I  do  not  criticize  this  very  human  weakness.  I  merely  note 
it  and  remark  that  it  would  give  me  great  pleasure  to  be  able 
to  show  that  Immanuel  Kant,  who  stands  upon  an  imposing 
pedestal  in  the  philosophic  Hall  of  Fame,  consistently  disap- 
proved a  philosophy  which  does  not  strike  me  as  sound,  and 
consistently  approved  another  which  seems  to  me  more 
reasonable  and  more  in  accordance  with  sober  good  sense. 

60 


The   World  as  Idea  and  the  Reluctant   Witness     6i 

But  it  is  not  easy  to  claim  with  a  show  of  reason  that  Kant 
is  all  one's  own.  He  has  a  perplexing  habit  of  talking  now  on 
this  side,  now  on  that.  The  utmost  that  one  can  hope  to  do 
is  to  induce  men  to  believe  that  he,  on  the  whole,  wanted  to  be 
of  a  given  party,  and  that  he  was  anxious  not  to  be  classed  with 
certain  other  persons  toward  whom  he  shows,  in  various  places, 
a  lively  antipathy. 

"It  is  not  given  to  every  one,"  said  Kant,  "  to  write  with  so 
much  acuteness,  and  at  the  same  time  in  such  an  attractive 
manner,  as  did  David  Hume."  He  might  have  added :  "It  is 
not  given  to  every  one  to  write  with  such  lucidity  and  con- 
sistency that,  although  critics  and  commentators  may  differ 
as  to  one's  right  to  hold  given  opinions,  there  can  be  little  cause 
for  dispute  touching  the  fact  that  one  has  intended  to  take 
this  or  that  definite  position  and  no  other."  Had  Kant  pos- 
sessed this  gift  it  would  have  curtailed  enormously  the  Kantian 
literature.  Why  grope  one's  way  about  with  a  lantern  in  a 
world  already  sufficiently  illuminated  by  the  blessed  sun? 
But  this  gift  he  did  not  have. 

Neither  in  this  brief  chapter  nor  in  the  two  chapters  to 
follow  shall  I  attempt  to  prove  that  Kant  was  consistent. 
Consistency,  or  a  relative  degree  of  consistency,  was  a  simpler 
problem  for  a  man  like  Hume,  who  took  liis  philosophy  lightly 
and  could  view  the  demolition  of  a  world  with  good-humored 
cynicism.  To  say  that  we  are  compelled  to  believe  that  there 
is  an  external  world,  but  can  adduce  no  adequate  ground  for 
the  belief,  was  easy  for  him,  and  it  did  no  violence  to  his 
nature.^ 

Against  this  genial  skepticism  the  scientific  conscience  of 
Kant  rebelled.  The  earnest  httle  man  was  in  a  narrow  way; 
he  was  sore  pressed.  There  were  influences  at  work  to  drive 
his  unwilling  feet  along  the  seductive  path  that  ends  in  ideal- 
ism ;  on  the  other  hand,  he  felt  that  he  simply  must  not  lose 
the  physical  world  of  common  thought  and  of  science,  content- 


62  The   World  IVe  Live  hi 

ing  himself  with  so  poor  a  substitute  as  a  world  of  mere  ideas. 
So  he  beat  about  somewhat  at  random,  hitting,  I  think,  upon  a 
thought  which  could  really  help  him  out  of  his  difficulty,  but 
not  holding  to  it  very  consistently,  and  not  avoiding  certain 
lapses  into  two  t}TDes  of  philosophical  doctrine,  incompatible 
with  each  other,  and  incompatible  with  the  doctrine  in  which 
lay  his  only  hope  of  salvation,  namely,  the  attaining  of  a 
world,  the  real  world  of  science,  and  the  attaining  of  it  ration- 
ally, not  by  violence,  after  the  fashion  of  the  man  who  believes 
for  no  reason  at  all,  nor  by  unwitting  fraud,  after  the  fashion  of 
him  who  finds  himself  reduced  to  the  straits  of  Pierre  d'Ailly 
and  Descartes. 

The  two  ditches  into  which  Kant,  as  he  walked,  kept  stum- 
bhng  in  spite  of  himself  were  unequivocal  ideahsm,  on  the  one 
side,  and  the  doctrine  of  a  duplicate  world,  on  the  other. 
Should  any  one  care  to  maintain  that  either  of  these  doctrines 
may  properly  be  called  the  philosophy  of  Kant,  he  can  un- 
doubtedly find  some  passages  which  appear  to  support  his  con- 
tention. We  are  many  of  us  in  a  position  to  help  liim  by  giv- 
ing references  to  such.  It  is  worthy  of  remark,  however,  that 
Kant  is  more  often  to  be  found  in  the  second  ditch  than  in  the 
first,  for  he  took  much  less  pains  to  avoid  a  slip  in  that  direc- 
tion ;  and  it  is  further  worthy  of  remark  that  from  neither 
ditch  can  one  catch  a  glimpse  of  the  little  wicket  gate  which  was 
the  goal  of  Kant's  endeavor. 

I  have  already  touched  briefly  upon  Kant's  treatment  of 
''appearances"  and  "tilings."*  That  he  did  not  absolutely 
let  go  of  the  things  is  plain  enough  to  those  who  can  read  him 
without  prejudice.  On  his  own  principles,  and  concei\dng  of 
things  as  he  did,  he  ought  to  have  let  go  of  them,  of  course. 
Like  a  multitude  of  his  predecessors,  he  distinguished  between 
things  as  they  can  appear,  and  things  as  they  are  in  them- 
selves.    It  is  the  old  traditional  distinction  which,  in  Descartes 

*  See  Chapter  II. 


The   World  as  Idea  and  the  Reluctant  Witness     63 

and  Locke,  appears  as  that  between  ideas  and  the  physical 
causes  of  ideas.  We  have  seen  *  that,  even  in  the  philosophies 
of  such  thinkers,  it  is  hard  enough  to  keep  one's  hold  upon  the 
things,  as  all  connection  between  the  ideas  supposed  to  be 
immediately  given,  and  the  duplicates  of  such  ideas  supposed 
to  exist  without,  seems  to  be  cut.  Nevertheless,  whether 
one  has  a  right  to  assume  the  existence  of  the  things  or  not,  it 
is  not  palpably  absurd  to  talk  about  the  things  as  if  they 
existed  ;  one's  words  are  not  manifestly  devoid  of  meaning. 

When,  however,  Kant  takes  away  from  the  things  every 
single  mark  by  which  a  thing  of  any  sort  can  conceivably  be 
identified  as  such ;  when  he  denies  things  position  in  space, 
existence  in  time,  reality,  causal  relations,  quahties  of  every 
description,  indeed,  absolutely  everything  that  has  any  sig- 
nificance whatever,  —  then  it  is  natural  that  men  should  begin 
asking  themselves  what  he  has  kept  in  retaining  the  things, 
and  should  raise  the  question  whether  he  has  kept  anything 
whatever.  Those  who  do  not  want  to  beheve  in  the  things 
would  hail  every  fresh  robbery  perpetrated  upon  them  with  a 
sensible  pleasure  ;  and  they  would  end  by  saying:  "I  told  you 
so  !  Kant  does  not  really  believe  that  there  is  anything  there 
at  all." 

But  we  must  never  forget  that,  when  we  have  said  what  we 
think  a  man  ought  to  be,  we  have  not  necessarily  said  what  he  is. 
Strange  as  it  may  seem  to  the  uninitiated,  it  is  quite  possible 
to  make  things  and  their  existence  wholly  meaningless,  and 
yet  to  go  on  believing  in  the  existence  of  things.  Men  did  it 
before  Kant's  day,  and  men  have  done  it  since.  In  this 
chapter  I  am  chiefly  concerned  with  what  Kant,  in  spite  of  his 
treatment  of  things,  did  not  want  to  be,  and  what  various  per- 
sons have  wanted  to  make  him.  He  did  not  want  to  be  an 
idealist  —  the  ditch  on  his  left  he  would  avoid  at  the  risk  of  any 
degree  of  inconsistency,  for  he  believed  firmly  that  he  who 

*  See  Chapter  II. 


64  The   World  We  Live  In 

stumbles  into  it  loses  his  world  and  becomes  a  shade  among 
shadows. 

Before  proceeding  to  consider  the  evidences  of  this  inclina- 
tion and  conviction  on  Kant's  part,  it  is  worth  while  to  consider 
under  what  circumstances  one  may  be  assumed  to  mean  what 
one  says.  When  a  man  speaks  vaguely  and  his  utterances  do 
not  harmonize  with  one  another,  there  may  naturally  arise 
disputes  as  to  how  seriously  he  would  have  this  or  that  expres- 
sion of  opinion  taken.  Sometimes  men  say  things  without  fully 
realizing  in  what  sense  they  may  be  understood.  Sometimes 
their  utterances  are  the  expression  of  a  passing  mood,  and  do 
not  represent  anything  like  a  settled  conviction  or  habit  of 
thought. 

But  let  us  suppose  that  a  man  in  his  fifties,  one  who  has  all 
his  life  been  accustomed  to  critical  scientific  work,  publishes, 
after  at  least  twelve  years  of  reflection,  a  bulky  volume  in- 
tended for  the  learned.  Let  us  suppose  that  this  is  re\dewed 
by  another  scholar,  who  scents  in  it,  and  points  out,  an  afifinity 
to  Berkeley's  doctrine  of  the  World  as  Idea.  Let  us  suppose 
that  the  author  thus  reviewed  falls  into  a  high  state  of  exas- 
peration, and  publishes,  two  years  after  the  appearance  of  the 
book  criticized,  a  very  lengthy  and  elaborate  answer,  in  which 
he  repudiates  sharply  the  supposed  relationship  to  Berkeley, 
and  takes  occasion  to  make  various  strictures  upon  him  and 
upon  idealists  generally.  Let  us  suppose,  finally,  that  six 
years  after  the  first  publication  of  the  book  in  question,  the 
author  pubUshes.  a  second  edition,  modifying  the  work  in  the 
spirit  of  the  treatise  printed  four  years  before,  and  incorporating 
in  it  a  ''Refutation  of  Idealism."  ^  Can  we,  under  such  cir- 
cumstances, maintain  with  any  color  of  reason  that  the 
author's  antipathy  to  idealism  is  a  thing  to  be  taken  lightly 
and  to  be  explained  away  ?  Surely  not.  Kant  disliked  ideal- 
ism from  the  bottom  of  his  soul.  It  threatened  to  rob  him  of 
his  real  world ;  and,  if  he  could  help  it,  he  would  have  none  of  it. 


The   World  as  Idea  and  the  Reluctant  Witness     65 

It  is  no  wonder,  thought  Kant,  that  "the  good  Berkeley," 
holding  such  views  as  he  did,  "degraded  bodies  to  mere  illu- 
sory appearances."  ^  Nor  does  he  regard  Berkeley  as  stand- 
ing alone  in  his  unfair  treatment  of  the  things  revealed  by 
sense  :  "The  motto  of  all  genuine  idealists,"  he  writes,  "from 
the  Eleatic  school  to  Bishop  Berkeley,  is  included  in  the  for- 
mula:  'All  knowledge  through  the  senses  and  experience  is 
notliing  else  than  illusory  appearance,  and  only  in  the  ideas  of 
the  pure  understanding  and  reason  is  truth  to  be  found.' "  ^ 

Kant'^  strongest  point  is  not  the  history  of  philosophy,  and 
one  may  question  the  propriety  of  calUng  Parmenides  an  ideal- 
ist and  of  classing  him  under  this  title  with  Berkeley.  As  a 
matter  of  fact  the  former  held  on  to  what  the  latter  was  most 
anxious  to  throw  away  —  a  duplicate  world  beyond  appear- 
ances. Nevertheless,  Kant's  sagacity  was  not  at  fault  in 
detecting  that  each  did  a  certain  injustice  to  the  world  spread 
out  before  the  senses,  revealed  in  sight  and  touch  and  hearing 
and  the  rest.  Parmenides  and  his  followers  deliberately  de- 
graded it  to  the  rank  of  mere  appearance,  and  contrasted  it 
with  a  world  more  real.  So  did  many  others  who  help  to  fill 
the  long  stretch  of  time  between  the  Eleatic  and  the  first  great 
idealist.  Berkeley  made  a  brave  effort  to  avoid  this  blunder, 
and  insisted  upon  the  reality  of  the  things  we  see  and  touch. 
As  we  have  seen  in  the  chapter  on  the  Unreality  of  the  World 
as  Idea,  his  effort  was  a  comparative  failure.  Berkeley's 
"  things  "  were  not  the  real  things  of  common  sense  and  science ; 
in  spite  of  themselves,  they  have  a  flavor  of  the  Eleatic  unreal- 
ity ;  they  are  not  merely  appearance,  but  they  come  danger- 
ously near  to  being  "mere  appearance." 

All  those  who,  wittingly  or  unwittingly,  rob  of  their  reality 
the  things  given  in  our  experience,  Kant  is  disposed  to  con- 
demn en  masse,  as  guilty  of  genuine  idealism.  It  is  true  that 
he  calls  his  own  doctrine  idealism,  but  he  does  it  with  many 
apologies  for  using  the  word  at  all,  and  he  insists  that  it  is  the 


66  TJie   World  We  Live  In 

direct  opposite  of  "that  idealism  proper"  ^  to  which  he  has  so 
strongly  objected. 

He  has  used  the  word,  he  explains,  because  in  one  point  he 
agrees  with  the  idealists:  he  regards  space  and  time,  with  all 
that  is  contained  in  them,  as  belonging  to  the  realm  of  the 
appearances  of  things,  not  to  that  of  things-in-themselves  or 
the  properties  of  such.  He  believes,  however,  that  his  "so- 
called"  idealism  stands  alone,  in  that  it  regards  the  world  of 
appearances  revealed  to  us  as  a  world  which  owes  its  constitu- 
tion to  the  native  pecuHarities  of  our  sensibility  and  our  capac- 
ity for  thought.  Given  the  raw  material  of  sensation,  we  work 
it  up  into  a  world  of  things,  and  the  nature  of  our  minds  pre- 
scribes its  laws  to  all  possible  experience.  This  strikes  Kant 
as  putting  into  our  hands  a  sure  criterion  by  which  truth  may 
be  distinguished  from  illusory  appearance.^ 

His  own  idealism,  thus,  seems  to  him  to  be  so  different  from 
all  other  kinds  that  it  keeps  a  real  world,  whereas  all  others 
revel  in  unrealities.  "Idealism  proper,"  he  writes,  "has 
always  had  an  extravagant  aim,  and  can  have  no  other."  He 
will  have  no  confusions ;  he  would  like  to  have  given  to  his 
own  doctrine  some  other  name,  for  the  better  avoiding  of  such, 
but  he  compromises  by  calling  it  "formal"  or  "critical"  ideal- 
ism, and  he  hopes  that  this  may  distinguish  it  from  the  "dog- 
matic" idealism  of  Berkeley,  and  the  "skeptical"  idealism  of 
Descartes.^ 

Notwithstanding  his  apologetic  adoption  of  the  name, 
Kant's  resentment  against  the  extravagances  of  idealism  burns 
within  him.  The  idealist  threatens  to  rob  him  of  his  world, 
and,  by  the  saints  !  he  will  not  be  robbed  !  In  his  zeal  against 
unreality,  he  even  seems  to  forget  that  he  has  called  himself 
an  ideahst  of  a  sort,  and  he  incontinently  attacks  "ideahsm" 
without  giving  to  that  objectionable  substantive  any  qualify- 
ing adjective.  Thus,  he  writes  :  "However  harmless  idealism 
may  be  considered  as  regards  the  essential  ends  of  metaphysics, 


The   World  as  Idea  and  the  Reluctant   Witness     67 

although  it  really  is  not  harmless,  yet  it  must  remain  a  scandal 
to  philosophy  and  to  the  human  reason  in  general  to  be  com- 
pelled to  assume,  merely  as  an  article  of  faith,  the  existence  of 
things  external  to  us,  from  which  things  we  nevertheless  get  all 
the  materials  of  knowledge  even  for  the  internal  sense,  and  not 
to  be  able  to  refute  satisfactorily  any  one  who  takes  the  notion  to 
call  it  in  question."  This  is  from  the  preface  to  the  second  edi- 
tion of  the  famous  "  Critique  "  ;  and  in  the  same  bit  of  writing  he 
classes  together  idealism  and  skepticism  as  "dangerous  to  the 
schools,  but  scarcely  likely  to  be  taken  up  by  the  public." 

The  same  feeling  is  unmistakably  present  in  the  much-dis- 
cussed refutation  of  idealism  introduced  into  the  second  edition 
of  the  "Critique."  It  is  true  that  Kant  there  distinguishes 
between  different  kinds  of  idealism,  but  the  title  "Refutation  of 
Idealism  "  stares  us  boldly  in  the  face,  the  argument  is  preceded 
by  the  statement  that  "idealism"  brings  forward  a  powerful 
objection  to  proving  indirectly  that  things  exist,  and  in  an 
appended  note  we  are  informed  that  "the  game  played  by 
idealism"  is,  with  more  justice,  turned  against  itself. 

If  ever  a  man  was  anxious  to  clear  himself  of  the  charge  of 
consorting  with  Berkeleyans  and  all  such  pestilent  fellows,  it 
was  Kant.  He  would  have  a  physical  world,  the  world  recog- 
nized by  the  sciences,  the  world  of  permanent  things  outside 
of  us,  a  world  quite  distinct  from  mere  "presentations,"  or,  as 
Berkeley  would  have  called  them,  "ideas."  His  words  are  the 
more  emphatic  in  that  he  finds  it  not  a  little  difficult  to  answer 
satisfactorily  the  charge  brought  against  him,  and  that  he 
thinks  it  necessary  to  retain  what  is  to  him  an  offensive  name. 
We  are  not  the  less  warm  in  our  condemnation  of  ultra-con- 
viviality, if  we  feel  that  we  must  call  ourselves  moderate  drink- 
ers, and  if  we  learn  that  our  neighbors  are  inclined  to  refuse 
us  the  compliment  of  the  saving  adjective. 

I  have  dwelt  especially  upon  Kant's  antipathy  to  ideahsm, 
partly,  because  of  the  humorous  circumstance  that  he  has  the 


68  The   World  We  Live  In 

honor  to  stand  at  the  head  of  a  long  line  of  ideahsts,  whom, 
could  he  have  lived  and  have  retained  his  faculties  unchanged, 
he  would  undoubtedly  have  characterized  as  men  of  "extrava- 
gant" aims;  and  partly,  to  bring  out  clearly  the  fact  that  he 
really  was  very  anxious  not  to  get  too  far  away  from  Every- 
body's World,  and  not  to  repudiate  or  mutilate  the  body  of 
knowledge  contained  in  the  special  sciences,  in  the  vaHdity  of 
which  body  of  knowledge  he  had  an  unwavering  faith.  The  ac- 
ceptance of  "genuine  ideahsm,"  or  of  "idealism  proper,"  seemed 
to  him  to  imply  a  denial  of  the  real  external  world,  and  the  re- 
duction of  our  experience  to  a  realm  of  mere  illusory  appearance. 

We  hear  so  much  of  the  Kantian  idealism,  and  of  the  post- 
Kantian  idealism  in  its  development  in  Germany,  England,  and 
America,  that  we  are  apt,  even  when  we  have  some  acquaint- 
ance with  the  history  of  philosophy,  to  think  of  the  whole 
movement  as  more  or  less  dignified  by  the  weight  of  Kant's 
authority.  But  let  us  not  forget  the  facts.  David  Hume, 
seduced  thereto  by  Berkeley,  brought  the  external  world  into 
court  and  put  it  in  jeopardy  of  its  life.  Kant  felt  it  his  duty 
to  appear  and  to  testify  in  its  favor.  His  intention  was  un- 
mistakable ;  but  his  testimony  was  not  very  clear  and  it  was 
not  wholly  coherent,  so,  to  his  disgust,  he  went  on  record  as 
spealdng  rather  for  the  plaintiff  than  for  the  defendant.  It 
helped  him  little  that  he  returned  more  than  once  to  the 
court,  and  tried  to  make  it  plain  that  he  really  was  a  witness 
for  the  other  party.  Men  did  not  wish  to  hear  this ;  and  there 
have  been  those  down  to  our  own  time  who  have  refused  to 
take  seriously  what  he  saw  fit  to  say  in  emendation  of  his 
original  statement.^ 

If,  then,  we  decide  to  regard  Kant  as  a  witness  in  favor  of 
idealism,  let  us  do  him  the  justice  to  record  the  fact  that  he  was 
a  reluctant  witness.  He  is  willing  to  be  a  "so-called"  ^  ideal- 
ist, but  he  wishes  it  distinctly  understood  that  his  idealism  is 
neither  "genuine"  nor  "proper,"  and  that  he  is  not  a  man  of 


The 


World  as  Idea  and  the  Reluctant  Witness     69 


"extravagant"  aims.  No  world  of  illusory  appearance  for 
him  !  He  wants  real  things,  really  outside  of  himself,  and 
clearly  distinguished  from  "presentations,"  or  ideas,  wliich,  as 
he  expressly  tells  us,  are  all  fugitive  existences,  and  by  no  means 
to  be  identified  with  permanently  existing  external  things.^" 

Did  Kant  get  such  real  things  ?  Did  he  even  point  out  a 
way  by  which  they  may  be  gotten  ?  He  tried  three  ways,  all 
of  which  I  shall  consider  in  the  next  chapter.  But  I  must 
close  this  chapter  with  a  few  paragraphs  to  remind  us  again 
that  those  who  have  traced  some  kinship  between  Kant  and 
Berkeley  have  not  been  without  the  color  of  an  excuse.  Kant's 
first  visit  to  the  court  resulted  in  the  expression  of  some  very 
doubtful  sentiments.    Thus,  he  said  :  — 

"Whatever  the  source  of  our  presentations,*  whether  they 
are  due  to  the  influence  of  external  things,  or  are  produced  by 
internal  causes ;  whether  they  have  come  into  being  a  priori, 
or  empirically  as  phenomena ;  nevertheless,  being  modifications 
of  the  mind,  they  belong  to  the  internal  sense."  .  .  y^ 

"All  presentations  have,  as  presentations,  their  object,  and 
they  can,  in  their  turn,  be  the  object  of  other  presentations. 
Phenomena  are  the  only  objects  which  can  be  immediately 
given  us,  and  that  in  them  which  has  immediate  relation  to  the 
object  is  called  intuition.  These  phenomena  are  not,  however, 
things-in-themselves,  but  are  themselves  presentations,  which, 
in  their  turn,  have  their  object,  which  cannot  be  given  us  in 
intuition,  and,  hence,  may  be  called  the  non-empirical  or 
transcendental  object,  a  mere  x. 

"It  is  the  pure  concept  of  this  transcendental  object  — 
which,  indeed,  in  all  our  cognitions  is  always  just  the  same,  a 
mere  x  —  that  is  able  to  give  to  all  our  empirical  concepts  in 
general  their  relation  to  an  object,  in  other  words,  to  give  them 
objective  reality." 

In  the  sentences  following  this  extract,  Kant  goes  on  to  indi- 
*  Kant's  word  is  "  Vorstellung  "  ;  Berkeley  would  have  said  "  idea." 


70  The   World  We  Live  In 

cate  that  this  "relation  to  an  object"  signifies  only  that  our 
experiences  are  gathered  into  a  certain  unity,  and  ordered,  by  a 
native  power  of  the  mind.^- 

Kant  speaks  a  language  of  his  own,  but  there  is  no  reason 
why  the  thoughts  which  he  had  in  mind,  when  he  wrote  such 
sentences  as  the  above,  should  not  be  rendered  into  good  Berke- 
leyan  English.  In  such  a  dress  they  would  appear  about  as 
follows :  Everything  that  we  can  represent  in  the  imagination  or 
perceive  by  sense  may  justly  be  called  "idea,"  and  regarded  as 
in  the  mind.  The  things  we  perceive  we  must  not  suppose  to 
be  things  existing  independently  of  our  minds ;  they  are 
appearances.  These  appearances  we  refer  to  an  object,  which, 
as  it  can  never  be  given  in  experience,  and  must  remain  to  us 
wholly  unknown,  we  may  call  the  transcendental  object,  a 
mere  x.  It  is  the  relation  to  this  .r,  this  unknown,  —  wliich  is, 
by  the  way,  precisely  the  same  thing  to  us  no  matter  what 
objects  we  may  be  talking  about,  for  it  really  is  simply  an 
unknown  —  that  makes  our  experience  an  experience  of  things 
and  not  a  mere  flow  of  unrelated  ideas.  But  when  we  con- 
sider this  X  critically,  we  perceive  that  it  is  not  really  a  some- 
thing without  the  mind,  but  is  only  a  scheme  by  which  the 
mind  groups  its  experiences  and  introduces  order  into  them. 

I  can  conceive  Berkeley  reading  Kant's  utterances  and  ex- 
claiming :  We  are  brothers ;  we  are  fingers  of  one  hand  !  Why 
should  we  disagree  ?  I  am  not  so  sure  about  the  mind's  doing 
all  that  you  say  it  does ;  .  but  we  are,  at  least,  at  one  in  think- 
ing that  we  perceive  nothing  but  our  ideas ;  and  we  are  at  one 
in  our  readiness  to  throw  away  the  meaningless  and  useless 
duplicate  external  world  in  which  so  many  of  our  predecessors 
interested  themselves.  Our  world,  the  only  world  that  in  any 
way  concerns  us,  is  a  world  that  exists  in  minds.  You  are  an 
idealist  as  unequivocally  as  I  am. 

When  Kant  came  back  again  into  the  court  to  explain  him- 
self, and  to  insist  that  he  really  did  not  mean  to  be  a  witness  for 


The   World  as  Idea  and  the  Reluctant   Witjiess     71 

the  plaintiff,  he  did  not  speak  clearly  enough  to  cancel  all  that 
he  had  said  before.  People  still  shook  their  heads  and  said, 
On  which  side  is  the  man  talking  ?  Many  decided,  and  many 
still  think,  that  the  court  records  prove  the  Sage  of  Konigsberg 
to  have  been  a  great  and  a  very  ingenious  ideaUst  —  the  man 
of  all  others  who  dealt  the  independent  physical  external  world 
its  death  blow. 

The  situation  is  exquisitely  humorous.  Our  great  witness 
for  idealism  is  a  reluctant  and  sulky  witness,  a  protesting  wit- 
ness, a  witness  whose  heart  is  palpably  with  the  plain  man  and 
the  man  of  science.  Let  Parmenides  and  Plato  and  Berkeley 
soar  irresponsibly  if  they  will ;  ^^  he  wants  to  keep  his  feet  on 
mother  earth,  and  when  it  is  pointed  out  to  him  that  he  appears 
to  have  reached  the  region  of  the  clouds  himself,  he  expresses 
himself  with  asperity.  His  children  rise  up  and  call  him  blessed, 
but  he  talks  bitterly  of  "extravagance."  What  was  Kant 
thinking  about  when  he  begat  such  sons  as  have  succeeded 
him  !  Could  he  not,  at  least,  have  looked  more  narrowly  to  the 
terms  of  his  will,  putting  his  doctrine,  so  to  speak,  in  trust,  and 
providing  against  a  reckless  dissipation  of  the  principal 
brought  together  by  his  genius  and  industry?  But  it  is  too 
much  to  expect  even  a  great  philosopher  to  be  also  a  prophet ; 
just  as  it  is  too  much  to  expect  of  plain  human  nature  to  sup- 
pose that  it  will  forego  the  advantage  of  an  appeal  to  a  great 
name,  where  such  an  appeal  may  be  made  under  any  shadow  of 
an  excuse.  I  remind  my  reader  that  I  have  indicated  at  the 
beginning  of  this  chapter  that  I  am  as  sensible  as  others  of  the 
profit  to  be  drawn  from  an  association  with  the  great. 

But,  seriously,  it  is  very  clear  what  Kant  did  not  want  to  be. 
To  me  it  seems  equally  clear  what  he  did  want  to  be.  He 
wanted  to  be  a  scientific  man,  and  to  hold  unequivocally  to  the 
world  of  which  the  sciences  give  an  account,  a  world  to  which, 
in  his  opinion,  idealism  does  scant  justice.  How  he  went 
about  his  task  I  shall  discuss  in  what  follows. 


CHAPTER  VI 

THE   WORLD   AS   PHENOMENON 

I  HAVE  said  that  Immanuel  Kant  tried  three  ways  of  defend- 
ing the  real  external  world  accepted  by  science  and  by  common 
sense,  but  put  in  jeopardy  of  its  Hfe  by  David  Hume  at  the 
instigation  of  "  the  good  Berkeley."  It  is  a  matter  of  no  small 
moment  to  a  defendant  how  a  defense  is  conducted.  To  enter 
upon  three  distinct  and  incompatible  lines  of  defense  at  the 
same  time  may  well  cause  misgivings  in  the  mind  of  one  inter- 
ested in  the  outcome  of  the  trial. 

Let  us  suppose  it  is  a  question  whether  John  Smith  is  or  is 
not  officially  to  be  declared  dead  and  out  of  the  way  forever. 
Does  it  seem  wise  for  one  defending  him  to  maintain :  — 

1.  That  he  undoubtedly  lives,  but  in  such  retirement  that 
he  can  never  be  described  and  identified,  and  must  be  repre- 
sented always  and  everywhere  by  a  proxy  quite  unlike  him, 
namely,  by  the  shade  which  may  be  seen  in  the  court  ? 

2.  That  such  is  the  complexion  of  this  something  before  the 
court,  that  it  is  quite  impossible  to  include  it  under  the  category 
of  mere  shades,  all  appearances  to  the  contrary  notwithstand- 
ing? 

3.  That  John  does  not  enjoy  a  hypothetical  and  doubtful 
existence  at  all,  but  is  a  real  man,  actually  present  in  the  court 
in  propria  persona,  and  may  be  as  directly  known  as  judge  and 
jury  —  indeed,  has  been  known  by  judge  and  jury  ever  since 
they  had  the  sense  to  know  themselves  ? 

It  is  thus  that  Kant  would  save  for  us  the  world  menaced  by 
Hume.  He  will,  by  entering  upon  the  first  two  lines  of  defense 
indicated,  gild  the  refined  gold  of  seemingly  palpable  fact  re- 


The   World  as  Phenoine7ion  73 

vealed  to  us  in  the  third ;  but  his  intemperate  zeal  tarnishes  its 
fair  surface.  We  begin  to  be  suspicious  of  John,  whom  we 
thought  we  knew  very  well,  when  we  are  informed  that  he  is 
in  himself  unknown  and  unknowable,  but,  nevertheless,  exist- 
ent. Nor  are  we  reassured  when  we  are  encouraged  to  beheve 
that  the  John  we  see  before  us  must  be  real,  since  such  is  the 
constitution  of  our  faculties  that  we  cannot  but  make  him  a 
real  John.  Who  would  dare  to  talk  thus  about  a  man  outside 
of  the  pages  of  a  philosophical  book  ?  Are  we  really  talking 
about  a  man  ? 

The  fact  is  that  Kant  speaks  in  this  eccentric  fashion  because 
he  is  not  quite  clear  in  his  mind  about  John.  Defend  him  he 
must  —  what  would  life  be  without  him?  But  he  is  sadly 
hampered  in  his  defense  by  the  traditional  doctrine  of  the 
duplicate  world,  not  directly  known,  and  its  unreal  or  half-real 
representative  in  our  minds.  The  man  whose  existence  is  in 
question  seems  to  resolve  himself  into  two  men.  One  of  these 
is  unknown  and  is  palpably  not  a  man  at  all ;  the  other,  who 
can  be  inspected,  is  under  suspicion  of  being  no  true  man. 
The  case  is  a  hard  one.  Whom  are  we  to  defend  as  existent 
and  as  real  ?  Until  there  is  some  certainty  upon  this  point,  it 
is  impossible  that  we  should  speak  consistently  and  coherently. 

Berkeley  ignored  the  first  man,  and  did  his  best  to  rehabili- 
tate the  second.  To  Kant  it  appeared  that  his  efforts  were 
unsuccessful,  and  that  the  creature  for  which  the  Bishop 
vouched  remained  still  a  shade.  So  Kant  kept  the  duplicate, 
reduced  to  the  barest  ghost  of  a  duplicate,  and  he  begged  it  to 
defend  him  somehow  against  the  assaults  of  the  idealist. 
At  the  same  time,  he  insisted  that  the  shade  before  the  court 
was  a  very  good  shade,  of  settled  habits,  and  by  no  means  a 
mere  shade,  like  Berkeley's  disreputable  protege.  It  was,  to 
be  sure,  not  quite  the  real  thing ;  but  it  was  next  door  to  it, 
and  it  ought  to  be  good  enough  for  anybody. 

Upon  Kant,  the  champion  of  the  World  as  Unknowable 


74  The   World  We  Live  In 

and  of  the  World  as  Reputable  Shade,  I  must  dwell  for  a  Httle, 
before  I  turn  to  the  Kant  who  frankly  accepts  the  man  before 
the  court  as  he  is  accepted  without  hesitation  in  science  and  in 
common  life.  In  other  words,  I  must  consider  Kant's  two  un- 
successful attempts  to  be  a  realist,  before  I  discuss  his  discov- 
ery of  the  true  path.  It  would  not  be  fair  to  him  to  pass  them 
over  in  silence. 

**IdeaUsm,"  writes  our  would-be  reahst,  when  smarting  under 
the  charge  of  being  an  idealist  himself,^  "consists  in  the  asser- 
tion that  only  thinking  beings  exist,  and  that  the  other  things 
which  we  believe  to  be  directly  perceived  by  us  are  mere  pres- 
entations *  in  minds,  to  which  in  reahty  no  object  having  its 
existence  outside  of  minds  corresponds.  I  say,  as  against  this  : 
there  are  things  given  to  our  senses  as  objects  existing  outside 
of  us,  although  of  what  they  may  be  in  themselves  we  know 
nothing,  but  know  only  their  appearances,  that  is,  the  presen- 
tations which  they  cause  in  us  by  acting  upon  our  senses. 
Hence,  I  certainly  avow  that  there  are  bodies  outside  of  us  ;  in 
other  words,  there  are  things  which,  while  they  are  wholly 
unknown  to  us  so  far  as  concerns  what  they  may  be  in  them- 
selves, are  nevertheless  known  to  us  through  the  presentations 
procured  us  by  their  acting  upon  our  faculty  of  sense,  and  which 
we  call  by  the  name  'body.'  This  word,  then,  stands  for 
nothing  else  than  the  appearance  of  that,  to  us  unknown,  but 
not  on  that  account  less  real,  object.  Can  this  be  called  ideal- 
ism ?     It  is  its  direct  opposite." 

According  to  this,  what  we  see  before  us  in  the  court  is  not 
the  man  himself,  but  his  apparition,  an  "Erscheinung."  The 
thing  which  it  represents,  and  which  is  doubted  by  the  skeptic 
and  denied  by  the  idealist,  is  that  duplicate  world  which  Kant 
never  quite  plucked  up  the  courage  to  throw  away.^  Of  its 
uselessness  and  insignificance  no  one  can  be  more  clearly  con- 
scious than  he  appears  to  be  in  some  passages,^  but  he  has  not 

*  Kant's  word  is  "  Vorstellung"  ;  Berkeley  would  have  said  "  idea." 


The   World  as  Phenomenon  75 

always  that  consciousness,  and  this  ghost  continues  to  haunt 
him.  It  is  real,  and  yet  not  real,  something  and  yet  scarcely 
something,  theoretically  impotent  and  yet  capable  of  dictating 
his  terminology  and  of  coloring  his  views  of  what  is  revealed 
in  experience.  He  who  retains  even  a  trace  of  superstitious 
faith  in  this  ghost  is  compelled  to  do  injustice  to  the  man  before 
the  court.  That  man  becomes  to  him  literally  an  apparition, 
an  echo,  a  second-hand  something,  which  it  is  not  enough  to 
produce  in  public,  but  which  must  be  vouched  for  by  another. 
He  does  not  merely  ''appear,"  but  he  is  turned  into  "mere 
appearance." 

And  yet  Kant  sees  clearly  that  it  will  not  do  to  make  too 
unreal  the  man  before  the  court  —  the  external  world  as  it 
seems  to  science  and  to  common  sense  to  be  spread  out  before 
us  for  direct  inspection.  Who  can  construct  a  world  out  of  an 
"I  know  not  what"?  Has  it  any  place  in  the  system  of 
things  which  we  arc  concerned  to  know?  Does  any  science 
waste  its  time  in  looking  for  what  is,  by  hypothesis,  not  to  be 
found?  Does  any  man  in  private  life  institute  a  search  for 
"x's"  ?  Such  "a;'s"  are  not  ''bodies."  ^  They  can  be  called 
"objects"  only  in  a  secondary  and  doubtful  sense  of  the 
word ;  ^  objects  of  knowledge  they  are  not,  for  they  cannot  be 
known.  They  have  no  place  in  Nature,  for  Nature  consists  of 
something  wholly  different.^ 

It  is  absolutely  essential,  then,  that  something  be  done  to 
rehabilitate  the  very  man  before  the  court  —  the  world  that 
we  actually  hve  in.  It  is  the  only  world  that  means  anything 
to  us,  and  if  that  is  discredited,  we  lose  all.  May  we  not 
maintain  that,  although  it  is  appearance  {Erscheinung) ,  it  is, 
at  least,  not  illusory  appearance  {Schein)  ?  Can  we  not  dis- 
cover in  it  marks  that  redeem  it  from  the  charge  of  being  only  a 
world  of  ideas,  a  bad  Berkeleyan  dream  ?  Admitting  that  all 
things  must  be  classified  as  either  phenomena,  appearances,  or 
noumena,  the  unknown  correlates  of  appearances,^  and  admit- 


76  The   World  We  Live  In 

ting  that  noumena  simply  have  to  be  left  out  of  count  as 
unusable  material  for  world-building ;  why  not  maintain  that 
in  phenomena,  in  appearances  themselves,  we  have  what 
suffices  to  make  a  world,  and  a  very  good  world  at  that  ?  Let 
us  put  stiffening  into  appearances ;  let  us  encourage  them  to 
hold  up  their  heads  as  though  they  were  something  themselves, 
and  not  mere  shamefaced  shadows  ! 

Kant  is  earnestly  desirous  of  putting  stiffening  into  them. 
But  the  ancient  tradition  which  he  cannot  shake  off  has  already 
condemned  them  to  the  limp  and  spiritless  existence  of  copies, 
proxies,  mental  representatives  of  an  extra-mental  reality. 
He  struggles  with  the  old  conviction  that  only  mental  phenom- 
ena can  be  directly  known;  and  as  he  is  betrayed  into  making 
all  phenomena  mental  phenomena,  a  world  unequivocally  ex- 
ternal threatens  to  elude  him  altogether. 

"We  have  in  the  'Transcendental  Esthetics'  abundantly 
proved,"  he  writes,^  "that  everything  perceived  in  space  or 
time,  hence,  all  objects  of  an  experience  possible  to  us,  are 
nothing  but  phenomena,  in  other  words,  mere  presentations; 
and  these  as  presented  —  as  extended  things  or  series  of 
changes  —  have  no  independent  existence  outside  of  our 
thoughts."  And  again, ^  "Time  and  space,  and,  together  with 
them,  all  phenomena,  are  in  themselves  not  things,  but  are 
only  presentations,  and  can  have  no  existence  whatever  outside 
of  our  minds." 

All  phenomena,  all  appearances  whatever,  are  thus  in  us ; 
they  come  perilously  near  to  being  what  Berkeley  calls  "ideas." 
The  choir  of  heaven  and  furniture  of  the  earth  have  no  exist- 
ence independent  of  our  thoughts  and  perceptions.  At  best, 
they  can  only  be  considered,  when  we  are  not  actually  perceiv- 
ing them,  as  the  "possibilities  of  perception"  dwelt  upon  by 
Mill:  "That  the  moon  may  have  inhabitants,  although  no 
man  has  ever  perceived  them,  must  be  admitted ;  but  this 
means  only  that  we  could  in  the  possible  progress  of  experi- 


The   World  as  Pkejwmenon  77 

ence,  discover  them ;  for  everything  is  real  that  stands  in  the 
same  context  with  a  percept  according  to  the  laws  of  the 
progress  of  experience."  ^° 

The  man  before  the  court  is,  thus,  discredited  at  the  outset. 
He  is  a  man  who  exists  only  in  the  mind  of  the  spectator, 
an  internal  man ;  or,  if  external,  external  only  in  a  certain  doubt- 
ful sense  which  makes  his  "externahty"  difficult  to  distinguish 
from  ''internahty."  We  may  refuse  to  call  him  "idea"; 
but  to  call  him  "presentation,"  and  then  to  say  that  presenta- 
tions can  exist  only  in  the  mind,  seems  no  better  than  a  round- 
about way  of  insulting  him. 

As  we  have  seen  in  the  last  chapter,  Kant  has  it  called  to  his 
attention  that  he  is  standing  with  his  arm  around  the  neck  of 
Berkeley,  and  he  is  properly  horrified  at  the  company  he  is 
keeping.  He  must  do  something  to  show  that  he  is  not  of  this 
party.  But,  instead  of  denying  unequivocally  and  at  once  that 
the  man  on  trial  is  an  "internal"  man,  a  mental  creature,  he 
insists  that  he  is  not  an  "internal"  man  of  the  sort  that  Berkeley 
supposes  him  to  he,  an  illusory  and  unreliable  idea,  but  is  an 
"internal"  man  of  a  quite  peculiar  constitution,  one  whose 
peculiarities  are  fixed  in  advance  by  the  nature  of  the  mind  in 
which  he  has  his  being,  and  one  whose  behavior  can,  hence, 
be  predicted. ^^ 

In  commenting  upon  Kant's  procedure  in  this  instance,  it  is 
necessary  to  point  out,  in  the  first  place,  that  Berkeley  never 
conceived  his  external  world  to  be  an  illusory  appearance,  but 
regarded  it  as  a  very  orderly  thing,  and  as  unquestionably 
real.^2  It  is  necessary,  in  the  second  place,  to  note  that,  al- 
though Kant  maintains  that  his  doctrine  of  fixed  forms,  native 
to  the  mind  and  dictating  their  character  to  objects  experienced, 
gives  us  a  "sure  criterion"  for  distinguishing  truth  from  illu- 
sory appearance;  nevertheless,  when  the  question  is  whether  any 
particular  presentation  {Vorstellimg)  is  to  be  taken  as  indicat- 
ing the  presence  of  a  real  external  thing,  or  is  to  be  condemned 


"jS  The   World  We  Live  In 

as  illusory,  it  never  occurs  to  him  to  fall  back  upon  this  cri- 
terion, but  he  distinguishes  between  real  and  imaginary  just 
as  Berkeley  did,  and  as  we  all  do  in  common  life.^^  Lastly,  it  is 
necessary  to  emphasize  the  fact  that  Kant's  second  line  of  de- 
fense is  not  a  defense  of  the  real  external  world  of  science  and 
common  thought  at  all,  but  is  an  abandonment  of  it.  It 
is  an  attempt  to  make  the  best  of  a  desperate  situation  — 
to  give  a  fictitious  externality  to  what  is  admittedly  in  the 
mind  and  nowhere  else.  Things  knowable  and  unknowable 
have  been  classified  as  phenomena  and  noumena.  Noumena 
have  been  as  good  as  thrown  away ;  they  have  been  banished 
from  nature.  Phenomena  have  been  put  into  minds.  Where 
in  the  world  are  minds  ?  Logically,  they  are  not  in  the  world 
at  all,  and  exist  at  no  time. 

This  is  the  demolition  of  Everybody's  World.  It  does  not 
light  it  up  for  us,  making  clear  its  outlines,  showing  us  what  is 
meant  by  the  distinction  of  ideas  and  things,  subjective  and 
objective,  mere  appearance  and  real  existence.  It  does  not 
justify  our  confidence  in  the  world  in  which  we  live  and  have 
lived,  but  arouses  a  just  suspicion.  If  nothing  better  than  this 
can  be  said  for  the  man  before  the  court,  he  is  surely  no  true 
man,  and  we  do  well  to  mistrust  him. 

It  is  with  relief  that  I  turn  from  Kant  the  mouthpiece  of 
ancient  metaphysical  prejudices  to  Kant  the  man  of  science 
and  of  robust  common  sense.  To  this  Kant,  in  spite  of  him- 
self, the  external  world  was  as  real  and  as  undeniable  as  it  is 
to  the  rest  of  us.  We  all  recognize  that  we  perceive  some 
material  things,  and  that  we  infer  the  existence  of  things  unper- 
ceived,  from  what  is  directly  revealed  in  perception.  Here 
Kant  is  with  us,  even  in  the  first  edition  of  the  "Critique." 

He  informs  us  that,  if  we  are  to  know  real  things,  we  must 
have  perception,  and,  hence,  conscious  sensation.  This  does 
not  mean  that  we  must  necessarily  perceive  the  object  itself, 
whose  existence  we  are  to  know.     But  the  object  must,  at  least, 


The   World  as  Phenomenon  79 

have  some  connection  with  a  real  perception,  according  to  the 
analogies  that  represent  real  connection  in  an  experience. 
Thus,  he  tells  us,  we  recognize  the  existence  of  a  magnetic 
matter  penetrating  all  bodies,  by  starting  out  from  the  percep- 
tion of  the  iron  filings  attracted  by  the  magnet;  and  this, 
notwithstanding  the  fact  that  the  constitution  of  our  organs 
makes  a  direct  perception  of  such  matter  impossible  to  us. 
We  know  that,  were  our  senses  more  acute,  we  should  in  expe- 
rience have  a  direct  empirical  intuition  of  what  is  now  beyond 
the  reach  of  our  vision.  The  coarseness  of  our  senses  is  not 
the  measure  of  existence.  Our  knowledge  of  the  existence  of 
things  reaches  as  far  as  perception  and  what  may  be  inferred 
from  perception  according  to  empirical  laws.^^ 

Kant's  illustration  of  the  magnetic  matter  is  taken  from 
the  science  of  the  day ;  but,  to  the  principle  which  it  illustrates, 
no  one  can  take  exception.  It  is  common  sense,  and  it  is 
science.  We  do  not  believe  that  things  exist  just  because  we 
think  of  them  ;  we  do  not  believe  that  only  that  exists  which  we 
actually  perceive;  we  believe  that  things  exist  if  their  existence 
may  be  inferred  from  what  we  perceive  according  to  certain 
rules  vouched  for  by  our  actual  experience  of  the  connection 
of  things. 

Nevertheless,  Kant  is  not  satisfied.  Have  not  the  phi- 
losophers claimed  that  all  these  experienced  things  are  only 
ideas,  and  nothing  external  ?  How  shall  we  refute  the  philos- 
ophers, and  save  the  real  external  world  ?  He  who  admits 
that  only  the  mind  and  its  ideas  are  immediately  known  re- 
duces the  outer  world  to  the  conclusion  of  a  dubious  process 
of  reasoning  —  it  is  banished  from  actual  experience,  and  the 
skeptic  who  doubts  its  existence  is  never  actually  refuted. 
What  we  want  is  indubitable  certainty.  External  things  must 
be  put  upon  the  same  footing  upon  which  we  stand  ourselves. 
We  never  think  of  doubting  our  own  existence ;  let  us  treat  the 
world  as  generously  and  admit  it  as  unequivocally. 


8o  The  World  We  Live  In 

There  is,  however,  only  one  way  of  annihilating  skeptical 
doubt  and  dogmatic  denial.  That  way  lies  in  maintaining  that 
the  external  world  is  as  immediately  experienced  as  are  our 
mental  states ;  that  things  are  as  directly  known  as  are  ideas, 
and  are  not  obtained  as  the  result  of  an  inference  from  ideas. 
Into  this  road  Kant  struck  at  last.  In  the  second  edition  of  the 
"Critique  of  Pure  Reason"  he  presented  the  famous  "Refuta- 
tion of  Idealism,"  which  is  his  most  serious  attempt  to  rehabili- 
tate the  external  world  —  to  show  that  there  can  be  no  reason- 
able doubt  touching  the  existence  and  the  reality  of  the  man 
actually  before  the  court. 

The  argument  is  the  elaboration  of  a  thought  which  is 
brought  forward  in  the  vivacious  answer  to  the  charge  of  being 
an  idealist  which  he  had  published  four  years  before.  There 
he  writes  :^^  "What  is  intuited  as  in  space  is  empirically 
outside  of  me ;  and  since  space,  with  all  phenomena  in  space, 
belongs  to  the  presentations  whose  connection  according  to  the 
laws  of  experience  proves  their  objective  reality,  just  as  truly 
as  the  connection  of  the  phenomena  of  the  internal  sense  proves 
the  reality  of  my  mind  as  an  object  of  the  internal  sense ;  it 
follows  that  I  am  through  external  experience  just  as  conscious 
of  the  reality  of  bodies  as  external  phenomena  in  space,  as  I  am 
through  internal  experience  of  the  existence  of  my  mind  in  time. 
Even  my  mind  I  know  only  as  an  object  of  the  internal  sense, 
through  phenomena  which  constitute  an  internal  state; 
the  being  in  itself  that  lies  at  the  foundation  of  these  phe- 
nomena is  unknown  to  me." 

Again :  "...  It  is  as  certain  an  experience  that  there 
exist  bodies  outside  of  us,  in  space,  as  that  I  myself  exist  as 
presented  through  the  internal  sense,  in  time ;  for  the  con- 
ception '  outside  of  us'  means  nothing  but  'existing  in  space.' 
However,  the  'I,'  in  the  proposition  'I  exist,'  signifies  not  merely 
the  object  of  internal  intuition,  in  time,  but  also  the  "subject' 
of  consciousness;   and  the  word  'body'  does  not  signify  only 


The   World  as  Phe7iomenon  8i 

the  external  intuition,  in  space,  but  also  the  thing-in-itself  that 
lies  at  the  foundation  of  this  phenomenon.  Hence,  it  can  with- 
out scruple  be  denied  that  bodies,  as  phenomena  of  the  external 
sense,  exist  outside  of  my  thoughts,  as  bodies,  in  nature.  But 
it  is  precisely  the  same,  if  I  raise  the  question:  whether  I 
myself  as  phenomenon  of  the  internal  sense  —  the  '  soul ' 
of  empirical  psychology  —  exist,  in  time,  outside  of  my  pres- 
entative  faculty ;  for  this  must  be  denied  as  well." 

Descartes  had  placed  the  external  world  among  the  tilings 
that  we  can  doubt ;  but  he  had  no  doubt  of  the  existence  of 
himself  and  his  thoughts.  Kant  wishes  to  put  the  external 
world  upon  precisely  the  same  level  as  the  latter.  Who 
knows  the  mind  as  a  thing-in-itself,  outside  of  experience? 
Who  need  know  or  care  to  know  the  external  world  as  a  space- 
less and  unperceivable  duplicate  of  the  world  revealed  by  the 
senses?  If  the  world  is  as  real  as  we  are,  the  only  "we"  of 
which  we  can  know  anything  whatever,  is  it  not  real  enough  for 
anybody?  We  are  conscious  of  ourselves;  we  are  also  con- 
scious of  bodies ;  in  each  case,  we  have  experience. 

Let  us  not  quarrel  with  Kant  for  his  not  wholly  successful 
struggle  with  "the  internal  sense"  and  "the  external  sense"; 
these  were  inherited  difficulties.  Let  us  forbear  to  ask  him 
in  what  sense  bodies  can  be  "outside  of  us,"  and  yet  exist  only 
in  our  "thoughts,"  which  are  presumably  "inside."  A  Hght  is 
breaking  in  upon  our  philosopher.  If  it  is  insufficient  to  scat- 
ter the  darkness  completely,  it  is  something  to  be  thankful 
for,  nevertheless. 

The  "Refutation  of  Idealism"  is  an  exceedingly  curious  bit 
of  writing.  Kant's  thought  is  not  very  clear  to  himself, — how 
could  it  be,  when  he  was  occup}dng  three  positions  simul- 
taneously ?  —  and  his  exposition  is  halting  and  repetitious. 
He  is  himself  not  satisfied  with  his  argument,  and  he  comes 
back  to  a  restatement  of  it  in  a  long  footnote  in  the  preface 
to  the  second  edition  of  the  "Critique."     In  each  instance,  he 


82  The   World  We  Live  In 

finds  it  necessary  to  insist  that  we  must  accept  as  fact  the  im- 
mediate consciousness  of  what  is  really  external,  and  is  not  mere 
''presentation"  in  us,  whether  we  can  or  cannot  understand 
the  possibility  of  such  a  consciousness.  This  means  that  the 
external  world  for  wliich  Kant  means  to  enter  the  lists  is  not 
idea,  is  not  presentation,  does  not  exist  only  in  our  thoughts, 
is  not  internal,  but  is  the  independent  external  world  of  science 
and  of  common  sense,  which  has  been  threatened  by  the 
philosophers. 

Of  this  world  we  have  as  direct  a  knowledge,  he  insists,  as 
we  have  of  our  own  ideas.  It  is  most  important  to  remember 
that  the  external  world  of  which  he  is  speaking  is  not  the  neb- 
ulous and  chaotic  realm  of  negations  to  wliich  things-in-them- 
selves  have  been  relegated.  We  not  only  do  not  know  that  im- 
mediately, according  to  Kant,  but  we  do  not  know  it  at  all. 
The  world  which  he  declares  to  be  truly  external  and  yet  im- 
mediately known  is  Everybody's  External  World  —  the  choir 
of  heaven  and  the  furniture  of  the  earth,  planets  seen  and 
unseen,  human  beings  and  possible  inhabitants  of  the  moon. 

The  argument  of  the  "Refutation"  is  as  follows:  ^^  "I  am 
conscious  of  my  existence  as  determined  in  time.  All  de- 
termination in  time  presupposes  something  permanent  in 
perception.  But  this  permanent  something  cannot  be  some- 
thing in  me,  just  because  my  existence  must  itself  be  deter- 
mined by  this  permanent  something.  Hence  the  perception 
of  this  permanent  something  is  made  possible  only  by  a  thing 
outside  of  me,  and  not  by  the  mere  presentation  *  of  a  thing 
outside  of  me.  It  follows  that  the  determination  of  my  exist- 
ence in  time  is  only  possible  through  the  existence  of  real 
things  which  I  perceive  outside  of  me.  Now,  consciousness 
in  time  is  necessarily  connected  with  the  possibility  of  this 
determination  in  time ;  and,  consequently,  it  is  necessarily 
connected  with  the  existence  of  things  outside  of  me,  as  the 

*  "  Vorstellung,"  —  the  word  covers  just  what  Berkeley  meant  by  "  idea." 


The   World  as  Pheno^nenon  83 

condition  of  determination  in  time.  In  other  words,  the 
consciousness  of  my  own  existence  is,  at  the  same  time,  an 
immediate  consciousness  of  the  existence  of  other  things 
outside  of  me." 

To  this  bit  of  reasoning,  which  cannot  be  said  to  shine  with 
a  steady  Hght,  Kant  appended  three  main  notes  and  a  foot- 
note. 

In  these  he  informs  us  :  that  ideahsm  assumes  that  our  only 
immediate  experience  is  internal  experience,  and  that,  starting 
out  from  this,  we  must  injer  external  things,  while  here  it  is 
proved,  not  presupposed,  but  actually  proved,  that  external 
experience  is  properly  immediate,  whether  we  can  conceive 
the  possibility  of  this  or  cannot ;  that,  furthermore,  all  our 
actual  determination  of  time  is  in  harmony  with  this,  for  we 
cannot  determine  time  except  by  taking  into  consideration 
things  and  their  motions  —  for  example,  the  motion  of  the  sun 
with  respect  to  terrestrial  objects ;  and,  lastly,  that  although 
the  existence  of  external  objects  is  indispensable  to  a  deter- 
mined consciousness  of  ourselves,  it  does  not  follow  that  every 
presentation  proves  the  existence  of  a  real  object,  for  there  are 
such  things  as  dreams  and  illusions  —  we  must  examine  our 
experience  in  detail  and  test  our  presentations  before  we  con- 
sent to  trust  them.  In  the  recapitulation  of  his  argument,  in  the 
preface  to  the  second  edition  of  the  "Critique,"  Kant  tries  to 
make  it  very  clear  that  the  external  and  permanent  something 
of  which  he  is  conscious  in  perception  is  in  no  sense  a  presenta- 
tion in  him,  for  all  presentations  must  be  fugitive  and  changing. 
It  is  really  and  unequivocally  external,  and  is  yet  immediately 
known. 

I  have  spared  the  reader  the  citation  in  full  of  Kant's  tangled 
and  patched  argument.  The  original  is  within  the  reach  of  all, 
and  I  have  given  the  substance.  John  Locke  deplored,  in  the 
preface  to  his  "Essay,"  that  "the  endeavors  of  ingenious  and 
industrious  men"  had  managed  to  make  of  philosophy,  which 


84  The  World  We  Live  In 

is  "nothing  but  the  true  knowledge  of  things,"  a  something 
"  thought  unfit  or  incapable  to  be  brought  into  well-bred  com- 
pany and  polite  conversation."  Certainly,  the  terminology  and 
the  style  of  the  "  Critique  of  Pure  Reason  "  are  not  to  be 
commended;  and  every  lover  of  Kant  must  regret  that  he  had 
not  the  gift  of  expressing  clearly  and  simply  the  profound 
thoughts  that  occurred  to  him,  no  one  of  which  is  incapable 
of  being  presented  in  a  dress  less  calculated  to  conceal  its 
form  and  features. 

Nevertheless,  in  spite  of  the  tangle  of  thought  and  lan- 
guage, two  cardinal  points  stand  out  unmistakably  :  first,  that 
the  real  external  world  is  as  immediately  known  as  our  own 
"presentations,"  which  Kant  treats  as  fugitive  existences  in 
the  mind  and  contrasts  with  things ;  and,  second,  that  what 
we  recognize  as  our  "internal"  experiences  can  only  be  as- 
signed their  place  by  having  recourse  to  the  external  order  of 
physical  things. 

It  may  seem  odd,  at  first  sight,  that  he  should  have  wished 
to  prove  what  he  claims  to  be  immediately  known.  If  the 
external  world  is  as  directly  known  as  are  our  ideas,  why  set 
out  from  the  latter  to  prove  that  we  must  immediately  know 
the  former  ?  Is  there  any  more  reason  for  this  than  there  is 
for  setting  out  from  the  former  to  prove  that  wt  are  conscious 
of  the  latter?  Again,  must  it  not  seem  odd,  to  one  who  is 
acquainted  with  the  two  philosophers  in  question,  that  Kant 
should  detest  Berkeley,  and  have  a  good  word  for  Descartes  ?  ^' 
He  evidently  stands  much  nearer,  in  certain  important  respects, 
to  the  great  idealist.  To  Berkeley,  the  real  external  things 
are  the  very  things  we  see  and  feel,  they  are  immediately  known ; 
to  Descartes,  they  are  the  hypothetical  duplicates  of  experi- 
enced mental  things,  which  latter  alone  we  directly  know. 

But  both  of  these  peculiarities  can  easily  be  explained  when 
we  realize  that  Kant  could  not  quite  strip  off  the  old  prejudice 
that  the  mind  is  shut  up  to  its  ideas,  and  that  one  must  begin 


The   World  as  PJienomenon  85 

with  ideas,  wherever  one  may  end.  That  he  retained  a  flavor 
of  this  is  clear  from  his  insistence  that  we  must  accept  an  im- 
mediate knowledge  of  external  things,  even  if  we  cannot  con- 
ceive how  such  is  possible.  The  difhculty  is  one  only  from 
the  standpoint  of  a  world  known  at  one  remove  —  the  Car- 
tesian. If  we  once  admit  that  things  cannot  be  known  except 
mediately,  and  by  inference  from  ideas,  then,  of  course,  it  is 
hard  to  understand  how  we  can  have  an  immediate  conscious- 
ness of  things. 

On  this  side,  Kant  is  not  wholly  out  of  sympathy  with  Des- 
cartes, although  he  combats  his  position.  Nor  is  he  out  of 
sympathy  with  him  in  a  second  matter  of  no  httle  significance. 
The  great  French  scientist  accepted  a  world  indubitably  real 
and  permanent ;  he  related  ideas  to  it.  To  be  sure,  he  thrust 
this  world  out  of  sight,  and  made  it  the  object  of  faith, 
not  of  direct  vision.  Nevertheless,  his  world  was  such  a 
world  as  Kant  wanted ;  it  was  not  the  iridescent  unreality 
mirrored  in  a  bubble.  Kant  wanted  this  world ;  he  wanted 
it  directly,  wanted  to  feel  sure  of  it,  as  Descartes  could 
not  be  sure.  But  he  did  not  want  a  cheap  substitute  for 
it  at  any  price.  It  was  this  that  Berkeley  ojEfered  him  —  the 
World  as  Idea. 

We  quite  miss  the  significance  of  Kant's  "Refutation"  if 
we  fail  to  see  that  he  made  an  important  advance  upon  Berke- 
ley. He  had  a  right  to  maintain  that,  in  intention  and  in  prin- 
ciple, at  least,  he  was  not  in  the  least  a  Berkeleyan.  At  one 
with  Berkeley  in  holding  that  things  immediately  perceived 
are  the  real  things,  he  denies  flatly  the  second  part  of  Berke- 
ley's contention,  namely,  that  these  real  things  are  ideas. 
To  Kant,  when  Kant  is  at  his  best,  they  are  not  ideas,  not 
"presentations,"  not  mental  things.  They  are  not  in  the  mind, 
but  are  really  external,  in  a  sense  of  the  word  which  keeps 
"external"  and  "internal"  sharply  contrasted,  as  they  are 
sharply  contrasted  in  science  and  in  common  thought. 


86  The   World  We  Live  In 

In  other  words,  Kant  stood,  not  for  the  doctrine  of  the 
World  as  Idea,  but  for  the  doctrine  of  the  World  as  Phe- 
nomenon. The  difference  is  far-reaching  in  its  significance. 
We  have  seen  what  consequences  Berkeley  deduced  from  his 
contention  that  the  World  is  Idea.  The  idealists  from  his 
day  to  ours  have  drawn  from  the  same  thought  conclusions 
scarcely  less  momentous,  if  somewhat  different.  To  none  of 
these  "extravagances"  does  Kant's  doctrine  of  the  World  as 
Phenomenon  commit  him. 

It  simply  cuts  off  an  unknown  and  unknowable  —  a  mean- 
ingless—  ''beyond,"  and  insists  that  the  real  world  is  the 
world  of  ideas  and  things  directly  revealed.  The  World 
as  Idea  is  the  World  as  Subjective  Phenomenon.  Kant  points 
out  shrewdly  that  the  World  as  Subjective  Phenomenon  is  a 
world  on  one  leg,  and  is  incapable  of  standing  alone.  His 
World  as  Phenomenon  has  room  in  it  for  the  subjective  and  the 
objective,  for  internal  phenomena  and  external  phenomena, 
for  ideas  and  things.  It  is  nothing  else  than  the  world  of 
experience.  Everybody's  World,  which  contains  minds  and  their 
ideas,  to  be  sure,  but  which  does  not  consist  exclusively  of  such. 
The  philosopher  who  accepts  it  frankly  has  to  mark  the  distinc- 
tion between  ideas  and  things,  and  to  point  out  clearly  what 
these  words  properly  indicate.  Kant  was  too  heavily  handi- 
capped with  tradition  to  do  this  satisfactorily.  But  he  should 
not,  on  that  account,  be  denied  the  glory  of  rediscovering 
Everybody's  World,  after  the  philosophers  had  played  with  it 
and  lost  it.  He  saw  it  dimly,  and  through  the  mists  of  old 
philosophies  —  but  he  saw  it  unmistakably,  and  he  fell  into  a 
rage  when  men  tried  to  filch  it  from  him. 

It  cannot,  then,  surprise  us  that  Kant  disliked  being  called 
an  idealist.  He  was  only  an  idealist  when  an  unlucky  slip 
carried  him  into  the  ditch  on  the  left.  And  he  was  only  a  real- 
ist of  the  old-fashioned  type  when  the  doctrine  of  the  duplicate 
world  pressed  him  too  hard  and  he  went  headlong  down  the 


The   World  as  Phenomenon  87 

slope  to  the  right,  becoming  thereby  as  a  sheep  in  the  hands  of 
the  skeptic.  From  the  first  ditch,  he  could  see  nothing  but 
Berkeley's  World  as  Idea,  which  he  repudiated ;  from  the 
second,  he  could  see  no  world  at  all,  but  must  content  himself 
with  a  shadow  cast  by  the  Unknowable.  The  real  world,  the 
world  we  live  in,  the  world  of  experience,  was  only  visible  when 
he  kept  to  his  true  path,  the  one  marked  out  in  the  "Refuta- 
tion." 

When  on  this  path,  Kant  is  not  an  idealist ;  the  thing-in- 
itself  does  not  exist  for  him,  it  is  a  silly  fiction  which  may  be 
dismissed  without  more  ado.  He  is  concerned  only  with  the 
ideas  and  things  revealed  in  experience.  In  other  words,  he  is 
a  Modern  Realist,  the  first  great  modern  realist,  the  dis- 
coverer of  the  World  as  Phenomenon  —  Everybody's  World, 
but  Everybody's  World  seen  under  a  clearer  light  and  with 
sharper  outhnes. 

Seen  under  a  clearer  light,  I  say,  because  it  is  no  small  thing 
to  recognize  explicitly  and  consciously  that  things  are  to  be 
found  in  appearances  and  not  beyond  or  behind  them ;  to  real- 
ize clearly  that  the  fact  that  we  have  senses  and  perceive 
things  does  not  in  the  least  make  it  doubtful  that  things  really 
exist  and  are  perceived.  Kant  stands  with  the  plain  man; 
but  the  plain  man  is  inarticulate  —  he  cannot  defend  his  own 
position.  Kant  is  articulate ;  or,  at  least,  he  makes  it  possible 
for  us  to  be  so,  if  we  will  but  learn  of  him.  Things  are  to  be 
found  in  appearances,  phenomena ;  and  yet  some  distinction 
is  to  be  drawn  between  things  and  their  appearances.  In  the 
past,  men  had  dwelt  upon  the  distinction  and  lost  the  things ; 
Kant  puts  us  in  a  position  to  keep  both. 

Now,  there  is  nothing  to  prevent  the  modern  realist,  who 
accepts  the  ideas  and  the  things  of  Everybody's  World, 
and  who  recognizes  that  both  stand  on  the  same  level  as  re- 
vealed in  experience,  from  beginning  at  once  with  an  examina- 
tion of  things  as  revealed.     He  may  analyze  the  experience  and 


88  The   World  We  Live  In 

show  just  what  it  is.  Idealism  is  sufiEiciently  refuted  by  simply 
pointing  out  that  we  actually  have  an  experience  of  things, 
and  that  the  universally  accepted  characteristics  of  things  are 
so  different  from  the  marks  which  lead  us  to  call  certain  expe- 
riences ideas,  that  there  is  little  excuse  for  confusing  the  two. 
Indeed,  one  may  point  out  that  in  actual  practice  the  two  are 
seldom  confused. 

If,  however,  one  has,  touching  the  immediacy  of  our  knowl- 
edge of  things,  secret  doubts,  or  has  even  those  vague  misgiv- 
ings which  are  the  traces  left  by  discredited  and  disappearing 
doubts,  it  is  perhaps  more  natural  to  attempt  the  rout  of  the 
ideahst  by  a  flank  movement.  One  may  reassure  oneself  and 
others  by  showing,  that  he  who  reduces  the  world  to  idea  loses 
his  world  altogether.  He  cannot  arrange  even  his  ideas  in 
any  semblance  of  order ;  he  cannot  identify  them  as  ideas. 
It  is  only  by  bringing  in  what  he  denies  that  he  can  avoid 
palpable  absurdity. 

It  is  undeniable  that  we  do  order  our  ideas,  and  do  not  whirl 
helpless  in  a  chaos  of  unrelated  experiences.  Here  I  sit  at  this 
moment.  It  is  I  who  sit  here,  and  not  another,  I  can  run 
back  in  memory  over  the  bygone  years  and  can  arrange  my  ex- 
periences in  a  certain  order  which  represents  a  life.  Once  I 
was  in  Philadelphia,  far  from  my  present  place  of  abode.  I  had 
percepts,  felt  emotions,  saw  visions  and  dreamed  dreams.  The 
years  succeed  each  other ;  they  stand  out  from  one  another. 
Those  experiences  really  did  take  place,  and  did  take  place  at 
definite  times,  the  intervals  between  which  are  measurable 
with  some  accuracy.  Later  I  was  in  New  York.  Other 
experiences;  other  dates.  Then  I  crossed  the  water.  The 
emotions  which  accompanied  the  crossing  have  their  own 
definite  place,  and  they  fall  into  it  with  automatic  precision. 
Here  I  am  now. 

Is  this  "now"  afloat  upon  a  sea  of  subjective  foam  and  tem- 
poral indeterminateness  ?     Has  it  no  fixed  and  measurable  re- 


The   World  as  P/ieuomenon  89 

lation  to  time  and  circumstance  preceding?  I  accept  it  as 
lying  somewhere  within  the  brief  span  which  stretches  between 
my  birth  and  my  resignation  of  this  pleasing  anxious  being. 
But  how  far  is  it  from  each  of  the  facts  recalled  to  me  by 
memory  ?  Where  is  my  measure  ?  Moreover,  the  two  insig- 
nificant occurrences  which  terminate  the  brief  span  alluded  to, 
and  which  form  the  extreme  hmits  of  the  line  upon  which  I  can 
arrange  all  my  subjective  facts  —  these  do  not  constitute  the 
beginning  and  the  end  of  time.  They  can,  it  seems,  be  dated. 
But,  with  reference  to  what  ? 

No  one  has  recognized  more  unmistakably  than  did  Kant 
that  striking  feature  of  Everybody's  World  dwelt  upon  in  Chap- 
ter I ;  namely,  that  all  subjective  phenomena  are  ordered  by  a 
reference  to  the  physical  system  of  things.  Not  by  a  refer- 
ence to  my  ideas  of  the  physical  system,  mark  you ;  not  by  a 
reference  to  the  ideas  of  some  one  else.  The  time  of  ideas, 
whether  the  ideas  be  mine  or  another's,  must  be  referred  to  the 
hour-glass,  to  the  clock,  to  the  diurnal  revolution  of  the  earth, 
to  the  changing  moon,  to  our  yearly  journey  around  the  sun. 
From  time  immemorial  have  men  thus  measured  time.  There 
has  been  no  other  way  of  doing  it. 

Let  one  seriously  make  the  attempt  to  fix  the  date  and  the 
duration  of  his  own  dream  by  keeping  strictly  and  unequivo- 
cally to  ideas.  Let  one  determine  the  time  of  one's  percept 
without  fixing  a  surreptitious  eye  upon  the  motions  in  nature! 
Kant  has  done  well.  He  who  denies  a  world  truly  external  has 
no  real  time  ;  a  fig  for  his  dates  —  they  amount  to  nothing  ! 

Nevertheless,  had  Kant  not  been  embarrassed  by  certain 
prejudices  touching  the  "internal  sense  "  and  time  as  its  "  form," 
he  might  have  followed  the  lead  of  his  great  predecessor  Aris- 
totle,* and  have  approached  the  question  in  a  broader  way. 
Can  all  experience  be  internal  experience  ?  If  there  is  no  world 
to  which  I  can  cling,  and  in  which  I  can  take  my  place,  I  am  no- 

*  See  Chapter  II,  p.  22. 


90  The  World  We  Live  In 

body  in  particular ;  I  am  nowhere ;  I  exist  at  no  date.  All  my 
ideas  are  adrift  —  or,  rather,  they  are  not  mine,  and  they  are 
not  ideas.  Contrasts  and  meanings  are  lost  in  the  great 
catastrophe  which  overtakes  not  merely  the  solid  world,  but 
even  time,  space,  and  all  our  ideas  of  things. 


CHAPTER  VII 

THE   REALITY    OF    THE    WORLD   AS    PHENOMENON 

Does  any  living  soul  in  Everybody's  World  think  the  less 
of  things  because  they  appear  ?  Here  is  my  table  before  me, 
here  is  my  hand  guiding  my  pen.  Table,  hand,  and  pen  all 
appear,  of  course.  But  that  is  what  makes  me  beHeve  in 
them ;  it  does  not  make  me  doubt  them. 

I  believe  also  in  a  multitude  of  other  things  which  do  not 
actually  appear  now.  Nevertheless,  they  belong  to  the  class 
of  things  that  might  appear.  Many  of  them  do  appear  some- 
times ;  and  those  of  them  that  never  do  appear  —  the  other 
side  of  the  moon,  the  center  of  the  earth,  and  such  things  — 
at  least,  belong  to  the  class  of  appearing  things,  and  stand  in  some 
intelligible  relation  to  those  that  fall  under  my  observation.  No 
man  could  induce  me  to  beheve  in  their  existence,  if  he  began 
by  denying  that  they  belonged  to  this  class  and  stood  in  this 
relation. 

The  appearing  things  above  mentioned  I  call,  in  accordance 
with  common  usage,  physical.  There  are,  however,  other 
things  that  appear  also.  Dreams  appear,  memories  appear, 
sensations  and  voHtions  appear.  If  they  did  not,  I  should 
know  nothing  and  say  nothing  about  them.  These  things, 
again  in  accordance  with  conmion  usage,  I  call  psychical. 

Now,  it  is  perfectly  certain  that,  in  common  life,  no  man 
regards  it  as  a  suspicious  circumstance  that  tables  and  chairs 
should  appear.  It  is  equally  certain  that  no  one  finds  it  strange 
that  thoughts  and  feehngs  should  appear,  too.  The  appear- 
ing, in  itself  considered,  is  not  enough  to  discredit  an  other- 
wise reputable  character;  no  one  dreams  of  so  regarding  it. 

91 


92  The   World  We  Live  In 

Whatever  else  is  or  may  be,  that,  at  least,  which  appears,  is. 
Appearance  is  the  foundation  upon  which  all  assertions  of 
existence  rest. 

The  man  of  science  is  here  entirely  at  one  with  the  plain 
man.  He  believes  in  what  appears,  and  he  believes  also  in 
certain  things  which  do  not  directly  appear,  but  which  he  con- 
ceives as  belonging  to  the  same  general  class  and  connected 
with  what  appears  as  those  things  that  do  appear  are  observed 
to  be  connected  with  each  other.  In  his  assertions  of  exist- 
ence, he  does  not  give  himself  up  to  a  debauch  of  the  crea- 
tive imagination.  He  begins  with  what  evidently  lies  be- 
fore him,  and  he  follows  the  thread  of  analogy.  If  he  did  not, 
he  would  command  no  respect  and  would  deserve  no  credence, 
whether  he  talked,  with  the  physicist,  of  stars,  atoms,  electrons, 
rays,  or,  with  the  psychologist,  of  sensations  and  judgments. 
He  rests  on  appearances  and  can  rest  on  nothing  else.  It  is  of 
no  small  moment  to  him  not  to  misconceive  appearances. 

One  can  misconceive  appearances.  One  can  ask  oneself 
doubtfully  whether  appearances,  phenomena,  are  such  stuff 
as  a  real  world  may  be  made  of  —  not  a  sham  world,  a  copy 
world,  but  a  real  world  which  contains  both  minds  and  physi- 
cal things.  That  the  doubt  is  not  unnatural  to  a  man  reflect- 
ing upon  his  world  rather  than  actively  using  it,  must  be 
evident  to  those  who  have  considered  the  poor  opinion  of 
appearances  arrived  at  by  the  long  line  of  thinkers  stretching 
between  Empedocles  and  John  Locke.  Such  a  prejudice 
against  appearances  is,  to  be  sure,  strikingly  out  of  harmony 
with  common  thought  and  with  accepted  scientific  procedure ; 
we  give  the  lie  to  it  every  day  in  actual  practice ;  and  yet  it 
has  held  its  own  with  extraordinary  tenacity. 

I  have  said  in  the  last  chapter  that  Kant  rediscovered 
Everybody's  World,  and  threw  light  upon  it  by  pointing  out 
that  it  is  a  world  of  appearances,  of  phenomena,  and  nothing 
else.     One  must  never  forget  to  add  that,  although  he  did  thus 


The  Reality  of  the   World  as  Phejiomenon      93 

characterize  it,  he  said  quite  enough  to  reassure  us  on  the  score 
of  the  respectability  and  the  trustworthiness  of  appearances. 
His  World  as  Phenomenon  is  simply  our  world  of  ideas  and 
things.  Within  it  there  is  abundant  room  for  the  common  dis- 
tinction between  appearance  and  reahty.  It  contains  appear- 
ances which  we  may  regard  as  mere  appearances,  as  the  rep- 
resentatives of  something  else.  It  contains  also  the  realities 
to  which  such  appearances  are  referred.  Indeed,  it  is  only 
within  it  that  the  reference  of  anything  to  anything  else  has 
any  significance  whatever.  It  is  the  world  of  experience  — 
which  only  means  that  it  is  the  experienced  world,  the  one  and 
sole  world  that  we  have. 

Kant  did  not  wish  to  deny  common  distinctions  which  are 
vouched  for  in  experience.  He  points  out  expressly^  that, 
within  the  realm  of  phenomena,  there  is  a  sense  in  which  we 
very  properly  distinguish  between  an  object  in  itself  considered 
and  the  particular  appearance  which  the  object  may  present 
as  perceived  in  a  given  instance  through  this  or  that  sense. 
He  insists,  however,  that  even  in  our  profoundest  investiga- 
tions into  the  world  presented  to  the  senses,  we  have  to  do 
with  nothing  but  phenomena.  Thus,  he  writes,  we  speak  of  a 
rainbow  as  mere  phenomenon  or  appearance,  and  of  the  rain 
as  the  thing  in  itself.  This  he  approves ;  if  we  mean  by  the 
word  "rain"  something  physical,  we  are  quite  right  in  so 
expressing  ourselves.  We  are  drawing  a  distinction  within 
experience,  not  passing  beyond  it.  The  rainbow,  the  rain- 
drops, the  very  space  through  which  the  drops  fall,  all  these 
belong  to  the  realm  of  phenom.ena.  An  object  beyond  the 
realm  of  phenomena  must  remain  unknown  to  us. 

As  we  have  seen,  Kant  denies  that  this  mere  cipher  can 
properly  be  called  an  object ;  he  says  that  to  us  it  is  nothing ; 
he  remarks  that  in  fact  no  one  ever  takes  the  trouble  to  ask 
questions  about  it ;  he  informs  us  that  it  is  only  phenomena 
that  can  concern  us  at  all.     Indeed,  whether  the    truth  was 


94  The   World  We  Live  In 

or  was  not  wholly  clear  to  him,  he  makes  it  immistakably 
clear  to  us  that  it  is  absurd  to  talk  about  realities  at  all,  if  we 
do  not  mean  such  reahties  as  are  revealed  in  experience,  reah- 
ties  which  must,  in  the  broader  sense  of  the  words,  be  called 
phenomenon  or  appearance. 

To  point  out  that  neither  in  common  Hfe  nor  in  science  can 
we  possibly  have  to  do  with  anything  which  may  not  properly 
be  called  phenomenon  is  merely  to  emphasize  a  commonplace 
truth  that  the  difficulties  of  reflective  thought  may  betray  us  into 
overlooking,  plainly  as  it  lies  before  our  very  eyes.  Imagine  a 
man  of  science  saying  :  "  I  am  now  perfecting  an  instrument  by 
the  aid  of  which  I  hope  to  reveal  what  is  in  the  nature  of  the 
case  incapable  of  detection!"  "By  the  ingenious  manipulation 
of  these  mathematical  formulae,  I  expect  to  prove  the  existence 
of  what  cannot  in  any  intelligible  sense  be  regarded  as  belong- 
ing either  to  the  physical  world  or  to  the  mental !  "  Such  a 
man  of  science  we  may  class  with  the  ingenious  men  of  Laputa, 
and  we  may  pass  by  on  the  other  side,  without  being  con- 
demned as  unreasonably  unsympathetic. 

But  it  is  one  thing  to  call  attention  to  the  commonplace  truth 
that  we  have  to  do  actually  only  with  phenomena,  and  it  is  a 
very  different  thing  to  slap  common  sense  in  the  face  and  to 
tell  it  that  all  phenomena  are  mental  phenomena.  Berkeley 
distinguished  between  appearances  and  real  things  as  well  as 
Kant,  but  he  insisted  that  both  must  necessarily  be  ideas.^ 
Kant  — the  Kant  of  the  "Refutation"  —  refused  to  see  the 
world  through  this  distorting  glass  and  to  give  it  a  gratuitous 
Berkeleyan  twist. 

He  begins,  as  we  all  do,  with  what  is  given  in  perception. 
He  accepts  the  existence  of  things  perceived,  and  also  the 
existence  of  things  which,  according  to  certain  empirical 
rules,  may  be  inferred  to  exist  if  we  start  out  with  what  is 
actually  perceived.  The  magnet  and  the  iron  fihngs,  the  earth 
and   certain  heavenly  bodies,   the   human   beings   that  sur- 


The  Reality  of  the   World  as  Pheno7nenon     95 

round  us,  belong  to  the  class  of  perceived  things.  The  hypo- 
thetical magnetic  matter,  stars  as  yet  undiscovered,  possible 
inhabitants  of  the  moon,  belong  to  the  class  of  inferred 
existences.  He  accepts  the  latter  class,  as  he  accepts 
the  former.  To  the  Berkeleyan,  the  distinction  is  between 
ideas  experienced  and  ideas  that  may  be  experienced ;  to  the 
disciple  of  Mill,  between  actual  perceptions  and  possible  per- 
ceptions; to  Kant,  between  external  things  perceived  and 
external  things,  just  as  really  existent,  but  unperceived.  In 
each  case,  what  is  directly  known  and  what  is  inferred  from 
what  is  directly  known  are  supposed  to  be  made  of  the  same 
stuff  —  the  Berkeleyan  begins  with  ideas  and  he  ends  with 
ideas ;  the  Kantian  begins  with  external  things  not  ideas,  and 
he  ends  with  external  things  not  ideas.  The  one  has  no  prop- 
erly independent  external  world,  as  all  ideas  must  be  "in  the 
mind  "  ;  the  other  has  such  a  world.  Thus,  the  second  man 
stands  on  the  side  of  common  sense  and  science ;  the  first  does 
not. 

Now,  the  Kant  who  thus  frankly  accepts  the  external, 
non-mental  world,  is  the  Kant  who  sees  clearly  that  it  is  the 
very  man  before  the  court  who  must  be  defended.  He  does 
not  deny  that  this  very  man  must  be  seen  with  the  eyes  and 
felt  with  the  fingers,  that  his  voice  is  a  voice  heard  with  the 
ears  and  imperceptible  to  a  deaf  man.  All  this  is  something 
to  be  taken  for  granted,  and  which  cannot  possibly  prove  our 
man  to  be  an  unreal  and  internal  man,  who  can  exist  only  in  us. 
The  man  is  not  literally  our  creature ;  he  can  come  and  go 
without  asking  our  leave,  and,  when  he  is  outside,  he  can 
signify  his  contempt  of  the  court  by  hurHng  a  stone  through 
the  window.  He  is  not  subjective  phenomenon,  mere  idea, 
but  he  certainly  is  phenomenon,  for  he  appears  now,  and  when 
he  does  not  appear,  he  still  belongs  to  the  class  of  things 
that  do. 

It  puzzled  Kant  that  the  man  should  be  phenomenon  and 


96  The   World  We  Live  hi 

yet  not  internal ;  related  to  the  senses  and  to  the  intellect, 
and  yet  independent  and  outside.  To  admit  the  relation  to 
sense,  and  then  to  explain  it  in  such  a  way  as  to  deny  that  there 
is  any  such  thing  as  sense,  seems  perfectly  absurd ;  to  deny 
the  relation  to  sense  altogether  seems  no  less  absurd.  Kant 
was  puzzled,  as  I  have  said ;  but  he  showed  his  good  sense  in 
keeping  his  feet  planted  upon  the  soil  of  Everybody's  World, 
and  in  accepting  the  distinctions  which  undoubtedly  obtain 
there  and  are  found  of  service. 

Some  things  are  so  much  taken  for  granted,  that  they  rarely 
occupy  our  attention,  and  are  in  danger  of  being  overlooked 
altogether.  Who  notices  the  air  he  breathes,  unless  it  is 
spiced  with  some  unusual  odor,  or  has  grown  so  foul  that  it 
cannot  be  breathed  with  comfort?  Under  such  conditions, 
we  do  notice  it,  and  we  discuss  it  with  one  another.  And  an 
unusual  turn  of  expression,  an  ambiguous  phrase,  the  bold 
assertion  of  some  philosopher  whose  name  inspires  awe,  such 
things  as  these  may  cause  us  to  stumble  even  upon  a  path 
which  we  have  traveled  for  years  in  easy  unconsciousness, 
and  may  lead  us  to  deny  or  to  doubt  what  has  presented  itself 
before  us  in  the  very  light  of  day. 

Have  we  not  always  known  that  things  appear  ?  Is  it  not 
assumed  without  question  in  all  that  we  have  to  say  to  each 
other,  that  we  are  talking  either  about  what  is  actually  expe- 
rienced, or  about  something  which  bears  some  analogy  to  it 
and  has  some  significant  connection  with  it?  And  have  we 
not  always  distinguished  between  mental  phenomena  and 
physical?  With  what  degree  of  patience  would  we  listen  to 
the  incoherent  babble  of  a  man  actually  incapable  of  drawing 
the  distinction  between  them  ?  What  should  we  think  of  a 
man  who  in  practice  treated  them  alike  —  a  man  to  whom  his 
own  ideas,  the  ideas  of  other  persons,  and  physical  things 
could  melt  weakly  into  one  indistinguishable  class  called 
"phenomena  "  ? 


The  Reality  of  the   World  as  Phenomenon     97 

The  road  which  we  habitually  travel  is  a  good  road.  It  is 
paved  with  well-tried  distinctions.  Nevertheless,  the  attach- 
ing of  a  word,  the  giving  of  a  name  to  which  we  are  unaccus- 
tomed, may  lead  us  to  view  our  old  familiar  friend,  Every- 
body's World,  with  a  suspicion  wholly  unwarranted  by  the 
discovery  of  any  new  and  damaging  fact.  The  World  as 
Phenomenon,  the  World  as  Appearance,  may  seem  to  us  to  be 
something  less  than  the  world  which  we  have  always  known. 

The  word  ''phenomenon"  has  a  suspicious  sound.  To 
some,  it  smacks  of  the  monstrosities  to  be  seen  in  the  dime 
museum ;  to  others,  it  suggests  rare  and  evanescent  occurrences 
in  nature,  such  as  the  borealis  race,  "that  fht  ere  you  can 
point  their  place  "  ;  to  still  others,  it  introduces  a  feeble-kneed 
creature  with  an  apologetic  smile,  a  poor  substitute  for  the  real 
man  with  whom  we  should  like  to  converse,  but  who  finds  it 
impossible  to  accept  in  person  the  invitation  to  our  philo- 
sophic symposium. 

The  less  technical  word  "appearance"  has  also  its  draw- 
backs. It  seems  almost  inevitable  that,  when  it  is  used,  the 
famihar  distinction  between  appearance  and  reality  should 
suggest  itself,  and  that  the  bystander  should  begin  to  think 
meanly  of  appearance.  He  who  is  willing  to  say  boldly  that 
the  world  is  appearance,  or,  worse  yet,  mere  appearance,  and 
who  leaves  it  to  his  reader  to  draw  his  own  conclusions  from  the 
remark,  is  pretty  sure  to  be  set  down  as  a  man  of  extravagant 
notions,  as  one  taking  a  mental  as  well  as  a  moral  holiday 
and  temporarily  irresponsible. 

Still,  it  seems  important  that  the  two  words  in  question  should 
be  saved  for  philosophy.  We  have  nothing  to  put  in  their 
place.  They  stand  as  an  admonition  to  talk,  when  we  talk 
at  all,  about  the  things  we  know  and  can  know,  rather  than 
about  those  that  we  do  not  and  cannot  know.  They  remind 
us  that  we  have  senses,  and  that  things  present  themselves 
under   varying  guises.     They  do  not   necessarily   say   any- 


98  The   World  We  Live  In 

thing  to  the  detriment  of  things,  for  it  is  clear  that  men  actually 
do  find  out  a  good  deal  about  things,  and  yet  it  is  evident  that 
it  never  for  a  moment  occurs  to  them  to  look  for  their  informa- 
tion elsewhere  than  in  appearances.  Where  else  could  they 
look? 

Let  us,  then,  approach  without  prejudice  the  World  as 
Phenomenon.  I  believe  that  if  the  speaker  is  sufficiently  care- 
ful and  explicit,  and  if  the  hearer  is  clear  minded  and  unprej- 
udiced, misunderstandings  may  be  avoided.  Our  task  is  a 
twofold  one.  We  must  endeavor  to  make  quite  clear  what  is 
the  significance  of  calUng  the  world  phenomenon ;  and  we  must 
try  to  show  how,  although  it  is  proper  to  describe  the  world 
thus,  there  may  still  be  a  physical  system  of  things,  properly 
external,  neither  a  mind  nor  in  a  mind,  but,  in  an  intelligible 
sense  of  the  words,  outside  of  all  minds  and  independent  of  our 
ideas. 


CHAPTER  VIII 

OUR   WORLD   AND   OTHER   WORLDS 

There  is  a  sense  in  which  it  is  palpably  absurd  to  speak  of 
any  save  the  one  universe  embracing  all  physical  Ihings,  and 
all  intelligences,  of  which  it  can  mean  anything  to  say,  "they 
exist."  To  it  belong  the  undiscovered  stars  of  which  Kant 
speaks ;  to  it  belong  unknown  planets,  and  their  inhabitants, 
if  there  be  any ;  to  it  belong  the  intelligences  of  men,  and  that 
whole  descending  series  ending  in  the  rudimentary  stirrings  of 
psychic  life  which  lie  on  the  borderland  of  which  we  know 
little  and  sometimes  speak  as  though  we  knew  much.  Any- 
thing that  ever  was  bears  an  intelligible  relation  to  anything 
that  ever  will  be.  In  a  sense,  it  belongs  to  the  one  whole  with 
it.  If  the  admission  that  the  universe  is  one  is  enough  to  con- 
stitute a  man  a  monist/  there  is  no  dweller  in  Everybody's 
World  who  may  not  lay  claim  to  the  title.  Is  he  not  at  once 
ready  to  hail  with  derision  the  statement  that  a  man  who 
never  lived  anywhere  once  discovered  a  planet  that  was  no- 
where to  be  found  ?  The  light  that  never  was  on  sea  or  land 
may  claim  his  recognition  if  we  give  it  a  lodgment  in  the  mind 
of  some  poet  who  himself  was  somewhere ;  but  eject  it  even 
from  this  corner  in  the  system  of  things,  and  he  exclaims, 
quousque  tandem  I  in  disgust. 

On  the  other  hand,  there  is  a  sense  in  which  it  it  is  true  that 
every  one  lives  in  his  own  world,  which  is  in  some  respects 
different  from  the  world  of  every  other  sentient  creature.  If 
the  assent  to  this  truth  is  enough  to  constitute  a  man  a  plu- 
ralist ,2  then  every  inhabitant  of  Everybody's  World  may  justly 
lay  claim  also  to  this  title.     He  knows  well  enough  that,  when 

99 


loo  The   Wo74d   We  Live  In 

men  make  statements  about  the  world,  they  are  talking  about 
something  of  which  they  believe  that  they  have  experience, 
and  he  is  quite  well  aware  of  the  fact  that  the  experience  of  one 
man,  as  such,  is  not  indistinguishable  from  the  experience  of 
another  man  or  from  that  of  the  brutes.  It  would  astound 
him  to  be  told  that  to  man  and  to  the  earth-worm  the  soil  with 
which  both  are  in  contact  could  seem  the  same.  Shall  we  take 
up  this  pluralistic  admission  and  thrust  it  home  to  him  ?  Shall 
we  cut  him  loose  from  his  cozy  home  in  the  shell  fixed  to  the 
rock  of  cosmic  fact,  and  cast  him  adrift  on  the  waste  of  waters  ? 
It  is  not  fair  to  Everybody  to  set  his  tacit  admissions  before 
him  in  unnatural  isolation,  rendered  explicit,  printed  in  capitals, 
exaggerated  singly  until  they  fill  his  field  of  vision  and  blot  out 
everything  like  a  background.  There  is  no  schoolboy  who 
does  not  have  occasional  aches  and  pains,  or  does  not  imagine 
himself  to  have  them.  If  we  put  into  his  hands  the  terrific 
descriptions  of  the  ills  that  flesh  is  heir  to  which  usually  accom- 
pany the  printed  recommendations  to  purchase  this  or  that 
bottle  of  patent  medecine,  we  may  easily  induce  him  to  believe 
that  he  is  the  victim  of  maladies  to  which  justice  can  be  done 
only  in  the  Greek  and  Latin  tongues,  and  which  are  the  heralds 
of  approaching  dissolution.  Some  men  have  in  the  past  talked 
about  the  "One"  in  such  a  way  as  to  induce  the  credulous  to 
believe  that  no  other  number  may  properly  be  called  a  number. 
Some  have  emphasized  the  diversity  of  our  experiences  in  such 
a  wise  as  to  suggest  to  the  man  of  visionary  temper  that  each 
of  us  creates  for  himself  a  world  out  of  practically  nothing, 
scarcely  even  needing  to  borrow  a  little  corner  of  chaos  on 
which  to  exercise  his  superabundant  energies.  Meanwhile,  it 
remains  true  that  Everybody's  World  is  a  very  good  world  to 
live  in,  and  all  actually  live  in  it.  It  is  a  world  in  which,  if 
distinctions  are  not  always  clearly  drawn,  they  are,  at  least, 
not  wiped  out  in  the  interests  of  somebody's  favorite  ab- 
straction. 


Our   World  and  Other  Worlds  loi 

Even  those  who  talk  intemperately  of  the  One  buy  and  sell 
as  though  dealing  with  the  Many ;  and  those  who  emphasize 
the  independence  of  Each  indicate  by  their  actions  their 
realization  of  the  fact  that  no  one  may  conduct  himself  as 
though  he  were  a  little  causa  sui,  had  no  neighbors,  and  might 
be  permitted  to  draw  space,  time,  and  the  starry  heavens  over 
the  borders  of  his  diminutive  farm,  setting  up  a  sign  to  warn  off 
trespassers.  Like  the  frightened  schoolboy,  we  find  it  possi- 
ble, in  the  intervals  between  our  paroxysms,  to  dispose  of 
hearty  meals  and  to  abandon  ourselves  to  sootliing  sleep  much 
as  do  those  who  are  not  about  to  die. 

Now,  in  talking  about  "the  World"  at  all,  we  tacitly  admit 
that  the  world  is  in  some  sense  one,  and  is  not  a  bit  of  private 
property.  The  same  tacit  admission  has  been  made  all  along 
by  the  men  who  have  built  up  step  by  step  a  series  of  sciences 
which  attempt  to  describe  the  world,  and  which  quietly  ignore 
the  differences  of  constitution  which  characterize  different 
individuals.  On  the  other  hand,  in  calling  the  world,  with 
Kant,  phenomenon,  we  admit  that  each  perceives  the  world  as 
it  is  revealed  to  him,  and  that  it  may  present  itself  to  dift'erent 
sentient  beings  under  different  aspects.  The  psychologist  is 
directly  concerned  with  these  aspects  as  such.  His  science 
has  manifestly  a  right  to  exist,  though  no  more  of  a  right  than 
such  sciences  as  astronomy,  geology,  physics,  and  chemistry, 
which,  while  concerned  with  the  world  as  phenomenon  and  with 
nothing  else,  can  afford  to  treat  the  fact  that  it  is  phenomenon 
as  something  to  be  quietly  assumed  and  as  needing  no  expHcit 
mention. 

In  a  sense,  then,  we  all  perceive  the  same  world,  if  we  may 
be  said  to  perceive  at  all;  in  another  sense,  what  one  per- 
ceives is  not  identical  with  what  is  perceived  by  another. 
These  distinctions  it  is  wise  for  us  to  accept.  Our  only  reason- 
able task  is  to  try  to  make  as  clear  as  possible  what  is  the 
significance  of   emphasizing  the  fact  that  the  world  is   phe- 


I02  TJie   Wo^dd  We  Live  In 

nomenon,  and  what  is  the  significance  of  the  assertion  that,  in 
spite  of  this  fact,  we  all  belong  to  the  one  world,  if  we  exist  at 
all.  In  the  present  chapter  I  shall  dwell  briefly  upon  the 
thought  that  the  world  is  phenomenon. 

Criticism,  like  Charity,  should  begin  at  home.  I  must 
recognize  that  the  world  is  phenomenon  to  me.  I  perceive 
things,  but  I  do  not  perceive  things  except  as  I  am  aware  of 
appearances.  It  forces  itself  upon  my  attention  that  the 
appearances  of  things  are  intimately  related  to  my  various 
senses.  To  the  eyes  things  present  themselves  as  colored,  to 
the  ears  as  sonorous,  to  the  finger-tips  as  hard  or  soft,  to  the 
taste  as  sweet  or  bitter.  Why  are  they  not  colored  to  the 
finger-tips  or  sonorous  to  the  tongue  ?  Evidently  the  consti- 
tution of  the  organ  is  not  something  that  one  can  leave  out  of 
account. 

This  established  relation  between  appearances  and  sense- 
organs  is  not  in  the  least  discredited  when  reflection  makes 
explicit  the  implicitly  accepted  fact  that  the  sense-organs 
themselves  are  only  known  in  appearances.  I  did  not  at  the 
outset  conclude  that  the  nature  of  the  appearance  is  related 
to  the  nature  of  the  sense-organ,  from  observing  that  an 
imperceptible  eye,  when  open,  made  possible  perceptible  sun- 
sets. From  the  outset,  I  was  concerned  with  an  eye  that  could 
in  some  way  be  perceived,  or  I  should  never  have  established 
any  sort  of  a  relation  between  open  eyes  and  seen  colors.  The 
unreflective  man,  who  is  interested  in  his  world  from  a  practi- 
cal point  of  view,  who  opens  his  eyes  and  shifts  his  position 
that  he  may  see  things,  who  turns  his  head  that  he  may  hear, 
who  raises  a  rose  to  his  nose  that  he  may  smell  it,  does  not 
come  to  his  conclusions  on  a  basis  of  no  experience  at  all.  He 
observes  certain  facts  and  he  utilizes  them.  One  of  the  most 
familiar  of  the  facts  known  to  him  is  the  relation  of  appear- 
ances generally  to  sense-organs,  which  sense-organs  also  he 
accepts  as  they  appear  and  because  they  appear,  although  it 


Our   World  and  Other   Worlds  103 

would  scarcely  occur  to  him  to  call  them  appearances.  Long 
before  I  was  capable  of  reflection  at  all,  and  at  an  age  at  which 
the  term  "phenomenon"  could  only  inspire  respect  through 
its  formidable  length,  it  was  by  connecting  phenomenon  with 
phenomenon  that  I  learned  how  to  see  things,  to  taste  things,  to 
smell  things. 

It  is  as  natural  to  observe  that  other  persons  have  bodies  and 
sense-organs  as  it  is  to  observe  that  I  have.  My  neighbor's 
eyes  are  open  to  inspection  as  well  as  are  mine.  He  acts  as  if 
he  saw  with  them.  I  infer  that  he  does  so,  and  that  there  is  an 
analogy  between  what  he  sees  and  what  I  see.  Sometimes,  I 
make  allowances  for  the  man.  If  he  is  blind,  I  do  not  expect 
him  to  see  at  all.  If  he  describes  the  red  flowers  on  the  table 
in  certain  ways,  I  infer  that  he  suffers  from  some  form  of 
color  blindness.  I  may  make  a  special  study  of  those  to 
whom  the  usual  avenues  of  sense  do  not  seem  to  stand  open  as 
they  do  to  most  of  us,  and  may  attempt  to  imagine  what  the 
world  as  revealed  to  them  must  be  like. 

I  need  not  here  enter  in  detail  into  the  question  of  our  infer- 
ences regarding  the  experience  of  the  world  enjoyed  by  beings 
that  have  a  bodily  constitution  in  some  respects  similar  to  and 
in  some  respects  differing  from  our  own^.  But  it  is  important 
to  bear  in  mind  certain  truths  admitted  with  practical  una- 
nimity both  by  the  scientific  and  by  the  unscientific.    These  are : 

1.  That  the  world  would  not  appear  to  us  as  it  does,  were 
we  ourselves  different. 

2.  That  it  cannot  appear  to  creatures  who  actually  are 
different  from  us  just  as  it  appears  to  ourselves. 

3.  That  it  is  reasonable  for  us  to  assume  that  it  does  appear 
to  other  creatures,  although  we  are  not  directly  aware  of  the 
appearances  vouchsafed  to  them. 

4.  That  it  is  not  absurd  to  try  to  form  some  notion  of  what 
the  dift'erence  between  our  experience  of  the  world  and  that  of 
other  creatures  may  be  like. 


I04  The   World  We  Live  In 

If,  then,  two  sentient  creatures  perceive  the  same  thing,  as 
it  seems  very  reasonable  for  us,  in  accordance  with  universal 
usage,  to  say  that  they  may,  it  does  not  follow  that  they  must  be 
having  the  same  experiences.  The  appearances  in  which  the 
thing  is  revealed  to  the  one  need  not  even  be  very  similar  to  the 
appearances  in  which  it  is  revealed  to  the  other.  This  should 
not  strike  as  astonishing  any  one  who  will  reflect  upon  the  fact 
that  he  himself  has  various  senses,  and  that  a  thing  present- 
ing itself  even  to  the  one  sense  does  not  always  present  the 
same  appearance.  He  does  justice  to  this  fact  in  the  state- 
ment that  he  perceives  the  same  thing  under  various  aspects 
or  in  its  varying  appearances.  And  when  he  says  that  he  and 
another  perceive  the  same  thing,  an  identity  of  experience  or 
appearance  is  no  more  essential  than  it  is  that  a  thing  as  given 
in  his  own  experience  should  smell  as  it  looks.  Whether  he  is 
concerned  with  his  perceptions  alone,  or  with  the  comparison 
of  his  own  with  those  of  another,  the  problem  is  the  same  — 
in  what  sense  is  a  thing,  revealed  only  in  appearances,  to  be 
distinguished  from  its  appearances,  and  in  what  sense  may  it 
properly  be  called  the  same  although  the  appearances  vary  ?  ^ 

The  fact  that  things  must  appear  different  to  different  crea- 
tures was  a  stone  of  stumbling  to  the  ancient  skeptic.  The 
World  as  Phenomenon  seemed  to  him  to  resolve  itself  into  a 
number  of  sham  worlds,  no  one  of  which  could  properly  claim 
to  be  real,  and  which  he  found  himself  unable  to  supplement  by 
the  addition  of  something  more  worthy  of  confidence.  How 
the  world  may  seem  to  beings  otherwise  constituted  than  are 
we  has  often  enough  been  matter  of  speculation  to  the  philoso- 
phers since. 

Kant,  who  emphasizes  so  strongly  the  fact  that  the  world 
is  phenomenon,  could  hardly  avoid  an  explicit  reference  to  the 
world  as  known  by  beings  other  than  man.  Did  he  not,  by  a 
sort  of  a  "Copernican  revolution,"  make  the  man  before  the 
court  our  satellite?     He  denied  that  we  perceive  him  to  be 


Otir   World  and  Other   Worlds  105 

real  and  ^respectable  because  he  is  such  independently,  and, 
hence,  impresses  us  as  such.  He  attributed  his  settled  habits 
to  the  fact  that  it  Hes  in  our  nature  to  thus  clothe  with  decent 
attributes  the  naked  unknown.  But  what  if  the  spectator 
has  some  other  nature  ?  All  tailors  are  not  alike.  The  infer- 
ence to  be  drawn  seems  obvious. 

It  is  only  from  our  human  point  of  view,  writes  Kant,  that 
we  can  speak  of  space  and  of  extended  thmgs.^  As  for  the  m- 
tuitions  of  other  thinking  beings,  we  cannot  judge  whether  they 
are  subject  to  the  same  limitations  as  are  ours.^  Time  is  merely 
a  subjective  condition  of  our  human  intuition,  and,  abstracted 
from  the  subject,  is  nothing.'^  We  know  only  our  mode  of  per- 
ceiving objects,  which  is  peculiar  to  us,  and  which,  though  it 
does  not  necessarily  belong  to  every  sentient  being,  does  be- 
long to  every  man.^ 

Kant  was  even  given  to  speculating  about  the  possible  ex- 
periences of  beings  with  no  senses  at  all,^  and  he  does  not  seem 
to  regard  such  speculations  as  wholly  insignificant.  In  these 
flights  we  need  not  follow  him ;  we  have  enough  to  reflect  upon 
if  we  will  consider  what  lies  at  our  doors. 

An  indefinitely  extended  series  of  beings  whose  bodily  con- 
stitution differs  more  or  less  from  that  of  man  forces  itself 
upon  our  notice.  Those  who  have  read  Darwin's  fascinating 
little  book  on  earthworms  will  recall  the  patient  efforts  of  that 
man  of  genius  to  arrive  at  some  notion  of  the  experiences  that 
can  constitute  for  these  lowly  creatures  the  revelation  of  a  world, 
if  we  may  call  so  bare  a  hint  a  world  and  such  a  darkling  glim- 
mer a  revelation.  From  the  hypothetical  psychic  life  of  m.icro- 
organisms  up  through  the  sweep  of  animated  nature  to  the 
brutes  which  we  recognize  as  humble  friends  and  with  whom  we 
can  have  a  fellow-feehng,  our  imagination  may  range  and  may 
picture  tentatively  a  series  of  phenomenal  worlds  all  differing 
from  our  own,  and  yet  not  one  differing  so  absolutely  and  to- 
tally that  it  is  meaningless  even  to  speak  of  it.     And,  notwith- 


io6  The   World  We  Live  In 

standing  what  Kant  has  to  say  of  the  specific  oneness  of  man- 
kind, we  may,  as  we  do,  ask  ourselves  seriously  how  the  world 
reveals  itself  to  the  child,  to  the  savage,  to  the  man  devoid  of  a 
sense  or  defective  in  intelligence.  It  is  not  nonsense  to  ask 
whether  things  in  space  as  revealed  to  those  born  blind  are 
things  in  space  as  revealed  to  us. 

The  doctrine  of  evolution  is  hoary  with  age.  But,  in  the 
half  century  which  has  elapsed  since  the  publication  of  Dar- 
win's immortal  work  "The  Origin  of  Species,"  the  conception 
of  a  gradual  development  of  the  organic  world  has  worked  with 
a  pecuHar  fruitfulness  in  the  mental  sciences  as  well  as  in  the 
physical.  The  dominant  idea  which  controls  the  thought  of 
the  present-day  investigator  is  that  mind  as  well  as  body 
must  be  treated  as  a  natural  phenomenon,  making  its  appear- 
ance under  given  conditions ;  to  be  accounted  for,  as  physical 
peculiarities  are  to  be  accounted  for,  by  a  reference  to  heredity 
and  environment;  "a  thing  so  intimately  related  to  the  body 
that  it  must  be  looked  upon  as  a  function,  an  instrument 
significant  in  the  struggle  for  existence,  a  something  full  of 
meaning  if  accepted  in  its  setting,  but,  torn  from  that  setting, 
a  riddle,  a  document  in  cipher,  an  unfruitful  fact  for  science."  ^° 

Thus,  the  world  as  perceived  by  each  creature  is,  in  a  sense, 
a  function  of  the  creature  perceiving  the  world.  It  could  not 
present  itself  as  it  does  if  he  were  not  what  he  is.  Each 
gazes  upon  his  own  world,  and  the  worlds  dift'er  in  glory  as  do 
the  stars.  Nor,  since  we  can  set  no  absolute  limit  to  the 
evolution  of  forms,  may  we  assume  that  the  world  considered 
from  the  human  point  of  view  is  the  world  in  a  sense  in  which 
no  other  can  properly  be  called  such.  It  is  a  very  good  world, 
but  there  may  conceivably  be  a  better,  if  we  mean  by  "better" 
farther  on  in  the  ascending  series,  possible  extensions  of  which 
naturally  suggest  themselves  to  us. 

Such  thoughts  put  in  a  somewhat  new  light  Kant's  "Coper- 
nican  revolution."     It  is  not  that  they  deny  that  interesting 


Our  World  and  Other  Worlds  107 

event  altogether ;  it  is  that  they  refuse  to  accept  it  as  a  cosmic 
fact  unique  in  its  kind  and  rendering  us  oblivious  of  all  other 
facts.  For  the  one  cataclysmic  revolution  is  substituted  an 
uninterrupted  series  of  revolts,  none  of  them  final,  suggesting 
the  normal  history  of  a  South  American  republic.  As  a  matter 
of  fact,  we  all  do  accept  the  World  as  Phenomenon,  and  we 
actually  find  within  its  hospitable  borders  room  for  a  whole 
series  of  phenomenal  worlds  differing  more  or  less  from  one 
another.  Only  one  of  these  is  ours  and  is  known  by  us 
directly ;  but  he  who  refuses  to  attribute  to  an  earthworm 
the  experiences  appropriate  to  an  ape,  not  only  recognizes 
these  many  worlds,  but  tacitly  accepts  the  fact  that,  in 
talldng  about  other  worlds  than  ours,  we  are  not  discussing 
a  mere  "x,"  but  stand  upon  the  basis  of  some  actual  knowl- 
edge of  their  nature. 

It  must  be  held  clearly  in  mind  that  no  one  of  these  worlds 
is  to  be  confused  with  the  unknowable  duplicate  world  dis- 
cussed in  Chapter  II.  Evidently,  they  all  stand  in  relations  to 
each  other.  It  is  hardly  just  to  call  them  worlds,  for  that  sug- 
gests a  self-sufficiency  and  an  independence  which  we  have 
clearly  no  right  to  attribute  to  them.  Let  us  rather  speak  of 
them  as  aspects  or  revelations  of  the  one  world,  the  World  as 
Phenomenon. 

The  many  revelations  Berkeley  recognized.  He  tried  to 
relate  them,  and  to  get  some  sort  of  a  world-system,  while 
treating  the  whole  world  as  idea.  Kant  pointed  out  that  times 
and  places  are  lost,  if  we  consistently  treat  the  world  as  idea. 
It  does  seem  undeniable  that,  if  times  and  places  are  lost,  it 
is  absurd  for  me  to  talk  of  an  evolution  of  living  creatures, 
and  to  plume  myself  upon  my  good  fortune  in  being  born  in 
the  fullness  of  time,  and  when  it  was  proper  for  such  an  expe- 
rience as  mine  to  come  into  being.  The  mere  recognition  of  the 
many  aspects  under  which  the  world  is  revealed  implies  the 
admission  that  the  world  is,  in  some  sense,  one ;  but  it  is  not 


io8  The   World  We  Live  In 

permissible  to  affirm  a  oneness  that  robs  of  their  significance 
the  many  aspects. 

Common  sense  and  science  relate  the  many  worlds  —  the 
many  aspects  of  the  world  —  to  each  other,  by  relating  each  to 
the  physical  system  of  things.  In  the  next  chapter  I  shall  try 
to  show  what  we  mean  by  this  physical  system,  and  to  make 
clear  how  grievously  we  wrong  it  when  we  call  it  "idea." 


CHAPTER  IX 

THE   WORLD   OF   THE   NEW   REALISM 

Bless  the  concrete  fact,  the  homely  illustration,  the  plain 
speech  which  does  not  throw  a  veil  of  obscurity  over  things 
familiar  !  It  does  seem  as  though  it  ought  to  be  possible  to 
describe  in  everyday  language  what  we  all  do  every  day,  and 
so  to  choose  our  words  that,  if  our  descriptions  are  an  inade- 
quate account  of  our  experiences,  their  inadequacy  may  be 
clearly  apparent.  In  the  present  instance,  let  us  begin,  since 
the  world  is  oppressively  wide,  with  some  definite  familiar 
thing  in  the  world,  and  let  us  see  how  every  one  treats  it. 

I  stand  at  a  certain  point  and  watch  a  woodcutter  at  work 
felhng  a  tree.  The  ax  swings,  the  chips  fly,  the  blows  re- 
sound. It  is  quite  true  that,  had  I  no  eyes,  I  should  not  see 
these  things ;  but  it  never  occurs  to  me  to  account  for  the  swing 
of  the  ax,  the  size  of  the  chips,  the  rapidity  of  the  progress 
made  in  the  work,  by  a  reference  to  my  eyes  or  to  my  brain. 
I,  the  spectator,  describe  what  is  taking  place  before  me,  and 
I  pass  over  in  silence  the  fact  of  my  presence  and  my  bodily 
constitution.  If  I  close  my  eyes,  my  experiences  vanish ;  if  I 
walk  toward  the  tree,  they  undergo  a  change.  But  I  should 
never  dream  of  saying  that  the  woodcutter,  the  ax  and  its 
motion,  the  tree  which  is  receiving  the  blows,  are  changed  by 
the  mere  fact  of  my  closing  my  eyes  or  moving  about. 

Now  I  stand  nearer  to  the  tree  than  I  did  before.  The  tree, 
the  ax,  the  woodcutter,  have  changed  in  appearance.  I  can 
distinguish  the  roughness  of  the  bark,  the  shape  of  the  cutting 
tool,  the  very  buttons  on  the  clothing  of  the  workman.  The 
differences  between  the  experiences  I  had  before  and  those  I 

109 


no  The   World  We  Live  In 

have  now  are  sufficiently  marked.  They  are  not  unaccountable. 
Everybody  knows  that,  to  explain  them,  I  must  bring  my- 
self into  the  reckoning.  I  say  that  tree,  ax,  and  woodcutter 
are  the  same,  but  that  their  appearance  has  undergone  a  change 
because  I  have  shifted  my  position.  In  the  new  position,  how- 
ever, the  swing  of  the  ax  and  the  flying  of  the  chips  have  the 
same  significance  that  they  had  before.  I  do  not  account  for  the 
motions,  the  rapidity  with  which  the  chips  fly,  the  deepening  of 
the  cut,  by  referring  to  myself.  In  either  position  I  may  be 
ignored,  and  changes  which  are  taking  place  may  be  described 
independently. 

Again.  When  I  ask  :  How  big  is  the  tree  ?  How  tall  is  the 
man  ?  How  much  does  the  ax  weigh  ?  it  is  quite  clear  that 
I  am  not  concerned  to  know  how  the  tree  or  the  man  appears 
under  these  or  those  conditions,  or  how  heavy  the  ax  feels  to 
my  right  hand  or  to  my  left.  When  I  am  interested  in  the  ap- 
pearances of  things  as  appearances,  I  put  my  questions  differ- 
ently. I  say  :  How  does  the  thing  look  ?  How  does  the  thing 
feel  ?  and  the  conditions  must  be  clearly  indicated,  or  the  ques- 
tions are  absurd.  On  the  other  hand,  to  insert  conditions  where 
they  are  out  of  place  is  equally  absurd.  I  may  not  say  that  a 
given  man  is  six  feet  tall  when  seen  close  at  hand,  or  that  an 
ax  weighs  four  pounds  when  one  is  tired ;  just  as  I  may  not 
say  that  it  is  ten  minutes  past  one  in  the  shade. 

To  be  sure,  had  I  never  seen  anything  or  felt  anything, 
I  should  never  ask  how  high  or  how  heavy  things  are.  But  this 
does  not  signify  that  I  cannot  estimate  measures  and  weights, 
while  ignoring  the  particular  relation  which  the  things  in 
question  happen  at  the  time  to  bear  to  myself.  I  measure  or 
weigh  one  thing  in  that  I  compare  it  with  another,  and  it  is 
tacitly  taken  for  granted  that,  if  a  direct  appeal  is  to  be  made 
to  immediate  experience  of  equality  or  inequahty,  the  conditions 
under  which  the  things  are  perceived  must  be  the  same.  I 
may  perfectly  well  say  that  a  given  insect  looks  a  quarter  of  an 


The   World  of  the  New  Realism 


III 


inch  long ;  but  I  never  mean  by  such  a  statement  that  it  looks 
as  long  as  a  quarter  of  an  inch  marked  off  on  a  foot  rule  would 
look  under  a  magnifying  glass. 

I  have  long  known  that  my  body  is  in  many  respects  the 
same  kind  of  a  thing  as  the  tree,  the  ax,  the  woodcutter. 
Some  parts  of  it  I  can  perceive  as  I  perceive  these.  My  hand 
may  be  brought  before  my  eyes,  it  may  be  moved  farther  off,  it 
may  be  put  behind  me.  The  appearances  vary,  and  I  distin- 
guish easily  between  such  changes  in  my  experiences  as  are 
accounted  for  by  the  relation  of  my  hand  to  my  eyes,  and  cer- 
tain other  changes  which  I  call  changes  in  my  hand.  If  my 
finger  swells  from  the  sting  of  a  bee,  I  do  not  refer  the  matter  to 
the  relation  of  my  finger  to  the  eyes.  I  regard  the  swelling,  as  I 
do  the  flying  of  the  chips,  as  a  thing  to  be  treated  independently. 
My  body  can  be  measured,  my  body  can  be  weighed,  my  body 
can  be  moved  to  or  from  other  bodies.  In  all  these  respects  it 
is  like  other  bodies ;  its  size,  its  weight,  its  motions  may  be 
treated  without  taking  into  consideration  the  particular  rela- 
tions of  any  part  of  my  body  to  any  sense. 

Suppose  that,  while  I  am  standing  opposite  to  the  woodcutter 
and  the  tree,  I  close  my  eyes  for  a  moment  and  then  open  them 
again.  I  may  observe  a  chip  to  fly,  without  having  seen  such  a 
swing  of  the  ax  as  preceded  the  flying  of  the  other  chips.  Shall 
I  say  that  the  flying  of  this  chip  is  a  thing  apart  and  unac- 
countable ?  May  I  maintain  that  it  was  brought  about  with- 
out any  stroke  ?  or  may  I  hold  that  the  position  of  the  ax 
before  I  closed  my  eyes  may  be  regarded  as  the  immediate  fore- 
runner of  the  occurrence  ?  No  one  ever  dreams  of  talking 
in  this  way. 

We  have  seen  that,  in  describing  what  is  happening  to  the 
tree,  we  can,  and  do,  leave  out  of  account  the  particular  rela- 
tion of  the  tree  to  our  sense-organs.  Among  the  things  that 
can  thus  be  left  out  of  account  is  this  closing  and  opening  of  the 
eyes.     Such  a  closing  and  opening  result  in  what  we  call  a  dig- 


112  The   World  We  Live  In 

appearance  and  reappearance  of  things  —  something  familiar 
to  the  most  unlearned,  and  which  no  one  is  tempted  to  confuse 
with  the  annihilation  and  re-creation  of  the  things  that  disappear 
and  reappear.  To  fall  into  such  a  confusion  would  be  an  error 
analogous  to  that  of  assuming  that  distant  trees  are  all  in  one 
piece,  and  only  divide  themselves  into  separate  leaves  as  we 
approach  them. 

Hence,  I  account  for  the  flying  of  the  last  chip,  just  as  I 
accounted  for  the  flying  of  its  predecessors,  by  referring  to  the 
swing  of  the  ax.  It  is  true  that  I  do  not  perceive  this  directly, 
but  I  can,  and  do,  ignore  the  fact,  just  as,  in  walking  toward 
the  tree,  I  ignore  the  fact  that  my  experiences  are  changing,  and 
say  that  tree,  ax,  and  woodcutter  remain  unchanged. 

These  objects  belong,  with  my  own  body,  to  a  much  greater 
system  of  more  or  less  similar  things.  This  I  discovered  long 
before  I  was  capable  of  reflection  upon  the  fact.  As  I  do  not 
at  all  times  perceive  the  few  objects  which  have  entered  into  my 
illustration,  and  do  not  at  any  one  time  perceive  all  parts  of  them, 
so  I  do  not  perceive  always  and  wholly  other  objects  which  be- 
long to  the  system.  That  does  not  at  all  affect  my  acceptance  of 
them  as  belonging  to  the  system.  To  be  sure,  I  must  have  evi- 
dence that  planets,  comets,  or  what  not,  do  belong  to  the  sys- 
tem ;  but,  given  such  evidence,  I  can  ignore  the  question  whether 
any  one  of  my  senses  is  or  is  not  at  a  given  time  affected. 

That  is  to  say,  in  dealing  with  the  perhaps  Umitless  physical 
world  of  which  so  small  a  part  is  at  any  time  directly  revealed 
to  me,  I  must  do  exactly  what  I  have  done  in  watching  the 
woodman  at  his  work  :  /  must  distinguish  between  two  orders  of 
phenomena,  and  must  he  carefid  not  to  confuse  the^n. 

The  phenomena  of  the  physical  order  constitute  the  world 
of  things,  the  only  world  of  things  that  we  know,  that  we  can 
know,  or  that  it  means  anything  for  us  to  know.  The  phe- 
nomena of  the  mental  order  we  contrast  with  this.  In  practice, 
the  two  orders  of  phenomena  are  confused  only  occasionally, 


TJie   World  of  the  New  Realism  w^ 


o 


and  through  what  is  palpably  a  blunder.  The  philosopher  may 
not  approach  the  distinction  of  physical  and  mental  as  though 
he  were  the  first  to  have  taken  account  of  it.  How  the  world 
of  things  should  be  dealt  with  has  been  settled  long  ago  in  com- 
mon hfe  and  in  the  special  sciences.  And  just  as  the  physical 
world  has  been  carefully  observed  and  described  by  speciahsts, 
so  a  man  who  is  more  and  more  becoming  a  specialist,  the  psy- 
chologist, has  devoted  his  attention  to  the  order  of  phenomena 
that  we  contrast  with  the  physical.  Are  we  in  doubt  just  what 
classes  of  phenomena  we  may  properly  term  mental  ?  we  may 
turn  to  the  psychologist,  note  what  he  has  seen  fit  to  appro- 
priate, and  mark  how  he  treats  his  material.  Manifestly,  sen- 
sations and  percepts  are  regarded  as  mental,  and  are  referred 
to  the  body.  Evidently,  certain  other  phenomena,  such  as 
fancies,  memories,  dreams,  are  also  regarded  as  mental  and 
are  also  referred  to  the  body.  The  detailed  classification  of 
mental  phenomena,  and  the  precise  nature  of  the  bodily  refer- 
ence in  question,  need  not  here  concern  us.^ 

But  it  does  concern  us  very  nearly  to  avoid  any  such  mis- 
conception of  the  two  orders  of  phenomena  as  may  occasion 
confusion  and  result  in  incoherence.  To  escape  this  disaster, 
there  are  three  points  which  we  must  never  forget  to  bear  in 
mind.     They  are  all-important. 

In  the  first  place,  it  should  be  remarked  that  the  series  of 
experiences  which  I  have  as  I  approach  the  tree  and  the  wood- 
cutter —  the  changes  that  I  regard  as  subjective — are  not  more 
directly  and  immediately  perceived  than  are  the  physical 
changes  of  which  I  have  experience.  That  the  tree  and  the 
man  change  in  appearance  as  I  walk  toward  them  is  a  fact  of 
which  I  am  immediately  aware.  I  am,  however,  just  as  imme- 
diately aware  of  the  swing  of  the  ax  and  the  fl>ang  of  the  chips. 
It  seems  incredible  that  prepossession  in  favor  of  some  in- 
herited philosophical  prejudice  should  absolutely  blind  a  man 
to  what  Hes  plainly  before  him  every  day  in  his  own  experience; 


114  ^^/^^   World  We  Live  In 

but  that  it  can  do  so  we  are  compelled  to  accept  as  fact.  He  who 
retains  in  his  thought  even  a  flavor  of  the  old  superstition  that 
mental  phenomena,  as  "internal,"  must  be  put  into  the  body, 
very  naturally  supposes  that  the  "mind,"  which  he  also  puts 
into  the  body,  knows  the  mental  phenomena  there  more  directly 
than  it  can  possibly  know  physical  phenomena.  This  he  may 
hold  in  spite  of  his  daily  and  hourly  experience  of  the  fact  that 
he  does  not  perceive  any  mental  phenomenon  whatever  to  be  in 
the  body,  and  does  not  perceive  the  mental  more  immediately 
than  the  physical. 

In  discussing  the  first  point,  the  immediacy  of  our  experi- 
ence of  physical  phenomena,  I  have  touched  upon  the  second, 
for  it  is  hard  to  keep  them  separate.  We  all  speak  of  the 
"external  world."  There  is  abundant  precedent  for  thus  char- 
acterizing the  physical  system  of  things,  and  for  contrasting 
with  it  our  sensations,  thoughts,  and  feelings,  as  something 
"internal."  These  expressions  do  not  strike  us  as  unnatural. 
Do  they  not  take  account  of  the  reference  to  the  body  which  is 
unmistakably  present  when  we  recognize  any  phenomenon  to 
be  mental  ? 

This  they  undoubtedly  do,  and  in  so  far  they  are  useful.  In 
view  of  established  usage,  it  would  be  foohsh  to  suggest  that 
they  be  discarded.  But  they  do  carry  with  them  the  sugges- 
tion that  mental  phenomena  are  to  be  regarded  as  in  the  body, 
and  the  influence  of  this  suggestion  many  find  it  difficult  to  re- 
sist. Historically,  their  error  has  a  certain  justification.  As  we 
have  seen  in  Chapter  II,  men  distinguished  at  a  very  early  date 
between  the  appearances  of  things  and  the  things  known  through 
appearances,  and  they  were  seduced  into  conceiving  of  the  ap- 
pearances as  little  copies  or  representatives  of  the  things  con- 
veyed into  the  body  through  the  channels  of  sense.  They 
thought  of  them  as  being  as  literally  in  the  body  as  is  any 
physical  organ  or  part  of  such.  Gradually  the  gross  materialism 
of  this  view  was  sublimated  into  something  more  or  less  differ- 


The   World  of  the  New  Realism  1 1 5 

ent ;  but  the  tendency  to  put  the  mind  somehow  into  the  body 
persisted  through  the  centuries,  and  in  various  quarters  it  per- 
sists to-day.  It  is  a  recrudescence  of  the  tendency,  in  the 
primitive  uncritical  simphcity  which  characterized  it  in  the 
early  Greek  philosophy,  that  leads  to  such  astounding  state- 
ments on  the  part  of  certain  of  our  contemporaries,  as  that  sen- 
sations are  to  be  placed  at  the  brain  terminals  of  the  sensory 
nerves. 

Contrast  with  all  this  the  actual  facts,  as  they  are  open  to 
inspection.  In  my  experiences  of  the  tree  and  the  woodcutter 
phenomena  of  two  orders  are  revealed.  Although  I  may  ac- 
count for  the  peculiar  appearance  of  the  tree  and  the  man,  as 
perceived  from  this  point  or  from  that,  by  referring  to  the  rela- 
tion of  my  body  to  these  objects  —  that  is  to  say,  although  I 
may  concern  myself  with  psychological  fact,  and  may  expressly 
refer  to  my  organs  of  sense  —  it  should  be  emphasized  that, 
under  no  circumstances  whatever,  is  the  peculiar  appearance  pre- 
sented by  the  tree  and  the  man  at  any  moment  perceived  to  he  in 
the  body.  I  should  add  that  our  fancies  and  our  dreams  are 
no  more  perceived  to  be  in  the  body  than  are  our  percepts. 

It  is  only  just  to  the  man  of  science  who  allows  himself  a  holi- 
day excursion  into  philosophy,  and  who  talks  unbecomingly  of 
sensations  and  ideas,  to  point  out  that  he  is  half  aware  that  he  is 
playing.  He  has  fallen  into  an  ancient  error,  but  he  has  not 
fallen  flat  on  his  back,  as  a  man  might  have  done,  as,  indeed, 
men  did  do,  two  thousand  years  ago.  We  are  none  of  us  an- 
cient Greeks.  No  man  would  be  more  astonished  than  the 
modern  physiologist  actually  to  find  a  sensation  of  any  kind 
at  any  end  of  any  nerve.  He  would  as  soon  think  of  coming 
upon  Banquo's  ghost  there.  Not  so  Lucretius,  the  Roman 
disciple  of  Epicurus.  With  what  hopes  might  he  have  been 
inspired  had  some  one  brought  him  from  Egypt  tales  of  an  in- 
strument resembling  the  modern  high-power  microscope  !  ^ 

When,  therefore,  we  speak  of  the  "external  world,"  we  none 


ii6  The   World  We  Live  In 

of  us  really  mean  by  the  expression  the  sum  of  physical  things 
outside  of  our  body.  All  the  things  really  in  our  body  are  just 
as  truly  physical,  and  have  their  place  in  the  external  world  — 
our  digestive  tract,  our  liver,  our  heart,  our  lungs,  aye,  our 
brain  and  every  part  of  it.  Nor  is  our  brain,  when  in  place 
and  functioning,  any  less  a  physical  thing  than  it  is  when  re- 
moved from  its  natural  setting  and  preserved  in  alcohol  in  the 
jar  on  the  shelf. 

Let  us,  then,  remember  that,  if  we  wish  to  mark  the  dis- 
tinction between  mental  and  physical  by  using  the  words 
"internal"  and  "external,"  it  is  open  to  us  to  do  so,  but  that 
it  is,  nevertheless,  inexcusable  to  confuse  quite  distinct  senses 
of  these  words,  and  to  allow  the  crude  ancient  doctrine,  whose 
echoes  have  come  down  to  us,  to  blind  us  to  facts  that  now  lie 
before  us  in  the  light  of  day.  Let  us  come  back  to  the  concrete 
facts  within  the  experience  of  every  one.  We  are  as  immedi- 
ately aware  of  physical  phenomena  as  we  are  of  mental,  and 
no  mental  phenomenon  presents  itself  to  us  as  in  the  body. 

In  the  preceding  pages,  I  have  not  obliterated,  but  have  rather 
emphasized,  the  distinction  between  mental  and  physical,  inter- 
nal and  external.  My  only  endeavor  has  been  to  make  quite 
clear  what  that  distinction  is.  I  hope  it  has  become  plain  that 
the  supposed  difficulties  connected  with  an  immediate  knowl- 
edge of  physical  phenomena  arise  out  of  a  blunder,  and  dis- 
appear when  that  blunder  has  been  avoided.  The  blunder  con- 
sists, at  bottom,  in  an  obliteration  of  the  distinction  between  the 
mental  and  the  physical.  The  mental  is  put  into  the  body  as 
though  it  were  physical,  the  only  physical  thing  immediately 
known,  and  things  properly  physical  are  treated  as  known 
through  it  and  at  second  hand.  Naturally,  under  the  cir- 
cumstances, an  immediate  knowledge  of  physical  phenomena 
appears  inconceivable. 

When  this  blunder  is  clearly  pointed  out,  wise  men  will,  I 
think,  seek  to  avoid  it.     It  does  seem  as  though  it  ought  to  be 


The   World  of  the  New  Realism  117 

admitted  that  to  make  the  mental  unequivocally  physical  is  a 
relapse  into  an  error  more  appropriate  to  the  childhood  of  the 
race  than  to  its  maturity ;  an  error  belonging  to  a  time  when  it 
did  not  seem  inappropriate  to  speak  of  mind-atoms  as  inhaled 
and  exhaled  with  the  air  men  breathe,  or  to  conceive  of  them  as 
penetrating  as  far  as  the  liver.  And  yet,  those  who  see 
clearly  enough  that  it  is  absurd  to  make  the  mental  thus 
physical  may  easily  fall  into  an  error  equally  fatal,  and  may 
rub  out  the  distinction  between  mental  and  physical  in  a  con- 
trary fashion  by  making  the  physical  mental.  This  brings 
me  to  my  third  point. 

Whether  we  make  the  mental  physical  or  the  physical  men- 
tal, we  in  either  case  obhterate  a  distinction  of  the  utmost 
significance  in  common  thought  and  in  science,  and  we  muti- 
late beyond  recognition  Everybody's  World.  The  two  errors 
appear  to  be  aspects  of  the  one  disease,  —  after  the  chill,  the 
fever.    Let  us  now  study  the  fever. 

We  have  seen  from  the  preceding  chapters  that,  whether 
we  are  concerned  with  the  mental  or  with  the  physical,  we  have 
to  do  with  phenomena,  and  with  nothing  else.  Mental 
phenomena  are  evidently  accounted  for  by  taking  into  con- 
sideration what  happens  to  the  body.  In  the  case  of  physical 
phenomena  the  relation  to  sense  is  ignored,  and  phenomenon 
is  connected  with  phenomenon  in  an  order  which  we  regard 
as  independent.  Nevertheless,  some  men  are  impelled 
to  ask  themselves :  Is  it  really  independent  ?  and,  in  spite  of 
common  sense  and  science,  they  are  inchned  to  answer  the 
question  in  the  negative. 

They  call  attention  to  the  truth  that,  while  we  ignore  the 
body  and  the  changes  taking  place  in  it,  these  things  exist, 
notwithstanding  the  fact  that  they  are  ignored.  The  man 
who  perceives  the  swing  of  the  ax  and  the  flying  of  the  chips 
has  senses,  or  he  would  not  perceive  them.  If  his  senses  were 
different,  he  would  not  perceive  them  precisely  as  he  does.     It 


ii8  The   World  We  Live  In 

will  be  remembered  that  these  commonplace  truths  have  been 
dwelt  upon  at  length  in  the  last  chapter.  In  this  one  it  only 
remains  to  ask :  What  is  their  significance  for  the  particular 
point  at  issue?  Can  one  infer  from  them  that  everything 
that  is  perceived  is  "internal,"  or,  in  other  words,  mental  ? 

I  think  it  must  be  evident  that  those  who  raise  such  a  ques- 
tion have  been  overwhelmed  and  thrown  into  confusion  by  the 
reaHzation  of  the  fact  that  the  very  stuff  of  the  physical  order 
is  phenomenal  stuff,  and  must  be  accepted  as  such.  They  can- 
not see  how  phenomenal  stuff  can  be  physical.  They  are  im- 
pelled to  lay  hands  violently  upon  it,  to  deny  its  externality,  to 
call  it  sensation  or  idea,  and  to  drag  it  bodily  indoors.  Then  we 
see  enacted  again  before  us  the  indecorous  comedy  of  the  over- 
zealous  man  who  begins  by  carrying  everything  else  into  his 
house  and  ends  by  carrying  the  house  itself  in,  Aristotle, 
Kant,  and  many  lesser  men  have  seen  that  such  incoherence 
must  be  avoided  at  any  price. 

The  best  way  to  avoid  such  incoherence  is  to  refuse  to  wander 
too  far  from  Everybody's  World.  He  who  quite  loses  sight 
of  it  may  find  himself  in  a  realm  in  which  he  is  without  a  cri- 
terion by  which  a  sensible  question  can  be  distinguished  from 
one  that  has  no  significance.  He  may  talk  of  ''independence," 
and  mean  by  that  word  an  independence  never  actually  attrib- 
uted either  to  minds  or  to  physical  things  by  mankind  gener- 
ally. He  may  discourse  of  "existence,"  and  give  the  word  a 
significance  which  no  man,  either  in  common  life  or  when  en- 
gaged in  scientific  investigations,  ever  thinks  of  giving  it.  He 
may  ignore  the  distinction  of  physical  and  mental  as  revealed 
in  experience  and  accepted  as  the  basis  of  certain  well-devel- 
oped sciences,  and  he  may  insist  that  the  words  can  only  have 
some  other  and  more  recondite  meaning  which  he  sees  fit  to 
read  into  them.  Having  done  this,  he  may  startle  us  with  the 
information  that  the  physical  world  is  not  independent  of  us, 
but  is  our  creature;   he  may  inform  us  that  physical  things 


The   World  of  the  New  Realism  1 1 9 

exist  only  when  perceived,  or,  at  least,  exist  at  other  times  only 
as  "possibilities  of  perception"  ;  he  may  virtually  deny  that 
they  are  physical,  and  prefer  to  speak  of  them  as  "sensation," 
all  common  use  of  speech  and  the  definitions  of  the  psychologist 
to  the  contrary  notwithstanding. 

To  escape  such  eccentricities  of  thought  and  expression  let 
us,  I  say,  come  back  to  Everybody's  World  and  take  a  closer 
look  at  it.  Such  an  inspection  may  help  us  to  decide  what 
sorts  of  questions  may  properly  be  asked  about  the  things  in 
it,  and  what  sorts  we  are  not  called  upon  either  to  ask  or  to 
answer. 

When  we  do  come  back  to  Everybody's  World  we  notice,  to 
begin  with,  that  it  is  absolutely  taken  for  granted,  both  in  com- 
mon life  and  in  science,  that  the  only  world  which  we  are  con- 
cerned to  talk  about  at  all  is  the  world  revealed  in  experience. 
This  is  so  much  a  commonplace,  that  it  passes  without  remark. 
Kant  was  shrewd  enough  to  see  that  this  is  the  only  world  re- 
garding which,  in  practice,  any  question  is  ever  raised. 

It  is,  furthermore,  taken  for  granted  that  the  world  a  man 
talks  about  is  the  world  revealed  to  him  In  this  sense  —  a 
very  harmless  sense  —  the  world  is  not  independent  of  him. 
When  we  have  admitted  as  m.uch,  we  have  not  conceded  that  he 
makes  the  world  ;  we  have  only  said  that  this  is  the  world  which 
he  knows,  or  he  would  not  be  talking  about  it.  And  it  is  taken 
for  granted  by  all  who  reflect  at  all  that  the  world  is  not  re- 
vealed in  just  the  same  terms  to  every  creature. 

These  assumptions  are  actually  made  by  those  who  ask 
definite  questions  and  expect  an  increase  of  information  from 
the  answers  to  them.  Questions  which  do  not  fit  into  the 
frame  of  these  assumptions  do  not  appear  to  have  any  sig- 
nificance for  human  knowledge.  "Tell  me  about  something 
that  nobody  has  ever  perceived  ;  something  that  nobody  may 
infer  from  what  he  has  perceived,  after  the  fashion  in  which 
we  infer  things  unperceived,   starting  from  something  per- 


I20  The   World  We  Live  In 

ceived  and  following  the  thread  of  analogy;  something  that 
cannot  even  be  shadowed  forth  in  the  imagination,  but  must 
be  expressed  in  unimaginable  terms!"  Does  one  man  of 
sense  make  such  demands  upon  another  ?  It  would  amount  to 
saying  :  "Tell  me  something  that  means  nothing  at  all ;  I  feel 
unsatisfied  with  significant  answers  to  significant  questions." 
As  to  a  man's  talking  about  the  world  in  terms  of  the  world 
as  revealed  to  him  —  no  one  wants  him  to  talk  in  any  other 
way ;  in  all  intelligent  investigation  it  is  presupposed  that  he 
will  talk  in  this  way  Who  would  dream  of  asking  the  geolo- 
gist to  describe  for  us  the  fauna  and  flora  of  Jurassic  times  in 
terms  appropriate  to  the  experience  of  a  reptile?  Any  one 
who  has  a  curiosity  to  know  how  the  world  may  have  seemed 
to  a  then  existent  reptile,  may,  if  he  will  turn  to  the  psycholo- 
gist and  ask  him  to  hazard  a  guess.  This  does  not  concern 
geology ;  the  geologist  gives  us  an  account  of  the  world  in  the 
only  appropriate  language  —  in  terms  of  the  phenomena  re- 
vealed to  a  human  being. 

That  the  account  is  given  in  such  terms  may  properly  be 
passed  over  in  silence,  for  it  does  not  affect  in  the  least  the 
question  whether  the  account  is  a  true  or  a  false  one.^  To 
dwell  upon  the  fact  that  it  is  given  in  these  particular  terms 
would  be  as  much  out  of  place  as  it  would  be  to  dwell  upon 
the  nature  of  my  senses  were  the  question  raised  whether  the 
head  did  or  did  not  fly  off  of  the  ax  which  I  saw  used  in  hewing 
the  tree. 

These  tacit  assumptions,  universally  made,  and  merely 
rendered  explicit  in  the  recognition  of  the  world  as  phenomenon, 
are  not  regarded  as  in  any  way  affecting  observed  distinctions 
within  the  phenomenal  realm,  such  as  that  of  physical  and 
mental.  There  is  no  reason  apparent  why  they  should  affect 
such  distinctions,  or  should  lead  us  to  call  the  mental  physical 
or  the  physical  mental.  Within  the  field  revealed  to  observa- 
tion, the  two  orders  of  phenomena  present  themselves,  and 


The   World  of  the  New  Realism  121 

should  be  accepted  as  they  present  themselves.  We  should 
accord  to  each  order  its  appropriate  treatment. 

This  impHes  that  we  should  really  treat  the  physical  as  phys- 
ical, and  not  raise  questions  which  have  no  significance  when 
we  are  deaHng  with  physical  things.  Let  us  turn  to  a  concrete 
instance.  Suppose  I  ask :  Did  the  above-discussed  ax  and 
its  motion  exist  during  the  interval  in  which  my  eyes  were 
closed  ? 

Manifestly,  the  question  cannot  be  intelligently  answered 
unless  it  is  an  intelligent  question.  If  I  understand  it  as  mean- 
ing :  Was  the  ax  perceived  while  it  was  not  perceived  ?  it  is 
not  a  question  that  a  serious  man  need  consider.  But  when 
we  examine  the  specific  cases  in  which,  whether  in  com- 
mon life  or  in  science,  men  ask  whether  this  or  that  thing 
exists,  we  find  that  they  have  no  intention  of  raising  any  such 
absurd  question.  The  question  which  they  raise  is  whether 
the  thing  may  properly  be  regarded  as  belonging  to  the  physical 
order,  and,  if  they  decide  that  it  may,  they  regard  its  existence 
as  estabUshed.  Whether  it  does  or  does  not  belong  to  the 
physical  order  is  a  matter  for  the  inductive  and  deductive 
logic  to  decide  on  a  basis,  ultimately,  of  a  direct  experience  of 
the  physical  order. 

The  words  "physical  existence"  have  absolutely  no  other 
significance  than  the  one  indicated.  To  claim  that  we  must 
first  prove  that  given  phenomena  belong  to  the  physical  order, 
and  must  then  go  on  to  prove  something  else,  before  we  may 
afl&rm  that  they  exist  or  have  existed,  is  to  give  an  arbitrary 
meaning  of  our  own  to  the  word  "existence,"  and  to  ignore  the 
common  and  proper  significance  of  the  term  in  the  language 
both  of  the  learned  and  the  unlearned.  Come  back  to  what 
men  actually  do,  when  they  are  intelligently  investigating 
nature.  Methods  of  proof  are  adjusted  to  what  men  want  to 
prove.  If  we  wish  to  prove  that  a  comet  was  at  a  given  dis- 
tance from  the  sun  at  a  given  time,  we  go  about  it  in  one  way : 


122  The   World  We  Live  In 

if  we  wish  to  prove  that  some  one  perceived  it  or  will  perceive 
it  at  a  given  time,  we  go  about  it  in  another  way.  The  mere 
fact  that  we  are  in  each  case  deahng  with  phenomena  consti- 
tutes no  valid  reason  for  confusing  things  so  different. 

In  the  illustration  of  the  tree  and  the  wood-cutter  it  became 
clear  that  two  orders  of  phenomena  are  actually  revealed  in 
experience,  and  that  they  are  revealed  with  equal  immediacy. 
Now,  he  who  calls  things  "possibiUties  of  sensation"  overlooks 
this  fact.  He  does  not  recognize  the  physical  as  physical, 
and  treat  it  as  such.  His  phenomenal  world  does  not  divide 
itself  into  mental  phenomena  and  physical  phenomena;  it 
consists  of  mental  phenomena  and  their  "possibihties" — in 
other  words,  their  ghosts.  That  men  do  afhrm  every  day  that 
all  sorts  of  things  exist  unperceived,  he  is  compelled  to  admit. 
But,  under  the  influence  of  the  prepossession  that  all  phenom- 
ena must  necessarily  be  mental  phenomena,  he  tells  us  that, 
when  we  use  such  statements,  we  can  only  mean  that  the 
things  in  question  might  be  perceived.  This  is  so  palpably 
out  of  harmony  with  what  we  do  mean,  as  is  evidenced  by  all 
our  deahngs  with  phenomena,  by  the  judgments  passed  unhesi- 
tatingly by  the  unlearned,  by  the  actual  divisions  of  the  sci- 
ences and  the  utterances  which  fill  scientific  books,  by  the  ac- 
cepted significations  of  the  words  and  phrases  in  common  use, 
that  it  seems  remarkable  that  the  statement  should  pass  un- 
challenged by  any  thoughtful  man  who  has  a  share  in  our  com- 
mon experience. 

The  plain  man  and  the  man  of  science  accept  the  two  orders 
as  revealed,  and  they  adjust  their  language  to  the  facts.  When 
they  say  the  tree  received  a  blow,  they  are  speaking  physically ; 
when  they  say  there  was  a  change  in  their  sensations  or  ideas, 
they  are  concerned  with  what  is  not  physical.  To  say  that  the 
percept  of  the  ax  struck  the  tree  is  not  merely  an  impropriety 
of  language,  it  is  an  impropriety  of  thought.  The  percept 
of  the  ax,  as  such,  has  no  place  in  the  physical  order,  and  it  is 


The   World  of  the  New  Realism  123 

nonsense  to  make  it  function  there.     Men  feel  that  this  is 
nonsense,  and  they  avoid  such  improprieties  in  actual  practice. 

And  if  it  is  improper  to  piece  out  the  physical  order  by  the 
insertion  of  percepts,  surely  it  is  no  less  improper  to  piece  it 
out  by  the  insertion  of  the  ghosts  of  percepts.  Men  do  not,  as 
a  matter  of  fact,  speak  as  if  they  wished  to  do  this,  and  we  must 
not  read  into  their  thought  all  sorts  of  things  gratuitously. 
He  who  talks  of  the  pterodactyl  undoubtedly  would  answer, 
were  he  asked  whether  he  might  have  seen  it,  had  he  been 
present  when  it  existed,  that  he  might  have  done  so.  But  to 
say  that  he  means  to  afhrm  this  when  he  says  the  creature 
existed,  is  not  more  reasonable  than  to  maintain  that  he  means 
to  affirm  that  he  might  have  seen  it  through  blue  glasses  or 
with  one  eye  shut,  as,  indeed,  he  might. 

Such  "possibihties"  may  be  left  out  of  account.  They  are 
numberless,  and  they  are  irrelevant  to  the  question  whether 
a  physical  thing  does  or  does  not  exist,  has  or  has  not  existed. 
As  a  matter  of  fact,  they  are  left  out  of  account  completely, 
when  the  man  of  science  offers  us  proof  that  something  exists 
now  unperceived  or  did  exist  at  some  time  in  the  past. 

To  the  question,  then.  Did  the  ax  swing  unperceived  ? 
we  may  unhesitatingly  answer,  yes  !  When  did  it  swing  ? 
Where  did  it  swing?  These  questions  have  significance,  if 
we  take  them  as  inquiries  respecting  the  particular  place  in  the 
physical  order  to  which  given  phenomena  may  be  assigned. 
Other  significance  than  this  they  have  none. 

He  who  cares  to  do  so  can  cause  himself  a  vast  amount  of 
needless  perplexity  by  proposing  insignificant  questions  and 
seeking  for  them  significant  answers.  It  means  something  to 
ask  where  a  given  tree  is.  The  tree  is  in  such  a  field,  on  the  out- 
skirts of  such  a  village ;  and  the  place  of  the  village  may  be 
indicated  by  reference  to  a  wider  setting.  But  if  I  go  on  to  say. 
Where  is  the,  perhaps  Hmitless,  physical  universe?  I  ask  a 
meaningless    question.     There    are    no    "where's"    and    no 


124  The   World  We  Live  In 

"when's"  that  do  not  gain  their  significance  from  this  physical 
universe  itself. 

Should  it  be  objected  :  Of  course,  it  is  foolish  to  ask  where  the 
physical  universe  is,  if  one  means  ^^ where  in  space'' ;  but  may 
one  not  ask  where  in  another  sense  of  the  word?  May  I 
not  ask  whether  the  physical  world  I  perceive  is  not  "in  my 
mind"  or  "in  me"  ? 

I  answer:  This  too  is  a  meaningless  question.  That  is  "in 
my  mind"  which  is  included  among  the  phenomena  referred 
to  my  body,  and  is  contrasted  with  the  physical  after  the  fashion 
dwelt  upon  in  the  pages  preceding.  That  I  recognize  anything 
at  all  as  in  my  mind  implies  that  I  accept  the  physical  as  such. 
The  same  is  implied  when  I  speak  of  other  minds.  I  may  refer 
to  what  was  in  the  mind  of  Alcibiades  when  he  docked  the  tail 
of  his  dog ;  I  may  dwell  upon  what  was  in  the  mind  of  the  dog 
on  that  occasion.  To  the  thoughts  of  the  Greek  reprobate 
and  to  the  sufferings  of  the  brute  I  may  assign  approximate 
dates  and  not  be  talking  nonsense.  But  I  escape  talking  non- 
sense only  so  long  as  I  accept  unequivocally  the  things,  places, 
and  dates  of  the  physical  system. 

The  blunder  of  those  who  first  recognize  an  external  world,  and 
then  drag  it  in  as  though  it  were  not  external,  lies  in  the  failure  to 
keep  the  physical  physical,  and  to  raise  no  questions  regarding 
it  save  such  as  may  properly  be  asked  touching  physical  things. 

Those  who  remain  upon  the  plane  of  common  sense  and  of 
science  do  not  fall  into  this  blunder.  They  do  not  locate  a 
town  in  the  state  of  Texas,  and  then  feel  dissatisfied  unless  they 
have  gone  on  to  locate  both  the  town  and  Texas  in  somebody's 
mind.  A  certain  instinct  leads  them  to  treat  the  physical  as 
physical,  and  to  be  content  with  that.  They  are  not  tempted 
to  regard  geography  as  incomplete  until  it  has  been  pieced  out 
with  psychology. 

Those  fall  into  the  blunder  who  have  begun  to  reflect,  and  yet 
have  not  reflected  sufficiently.     The  distinction  of  subjective 


The  World  of  the  New  Realism  125 

and  objective  is  forced  upon  their  attention.  They  recognize 
that  the  World  is  Phenomenon,  and  this  appears  to  them  to 
change  its  whole  aspect  —  to  pour  moonshine  over  the  system 
of  things.  Reahzing  that  physical  things  are  revealed  to  them, 
now  in  these  terms,  now  in  those,  and  to  other  creatures  in 
terms  that  are,  perhaps,  very  different,  they  find  themselves 
bemired.  Instead  of  reflecting  that  these  are  commonplace 
truths  of  which  human  knowledge  has  long  taken  account  with- 
out losing  the  physical  world  at  all,  they  imagine  that  they  have 
made  a  discovery  which  justifies  them  in  treating  the  physical 
as  though  it  were  not  physical,  and  in  applying  to  physical 
phenomena  inappropriate  names  which  would  be  instantly  con- 
demned as  inappropriate  and  out  of  place,  were  they  employed 
on  the  street  or  in  the  laboratory. 

Such  persons  fail  to  see  that  he  who  raises  the  question  how  it 
is  that  physical  things  are  revealed  to  me,  now  in  these  terms, 
now  in  those,  or  to  another  creature  in  still  other  terms,  is  not 
busying  himself  with  physical  problems  at  all.  The  latter 
can  always  be  solved  without  bringing  in  such  considerations. 
They  are  wholly  out  of  place  when  we  are  inquiring  whether 
any  physical  thing  exists,  or  are  trying  to  determine  the  time 
and  place  of  its  being.  Such  considerations  fall  within  the 
realm  of  the  psychologist,  whose  business  it  is  to  give  us  an 
account  of  the  experience  of  the  world  enjoyed  by  different 
creatures,  or  by  a  given  individual  under  varying  conditions. 
In  other  words,  they  belong  to  the  especial  province  of  the  man 
who  occupies  himself  expressly  with  phenomena  of  the  sub- 
jective order,  and  simply  accepts  the  external  world  as  a  matter 
of  course. 

So  much  for  the  third  of  the  points  that  I  have  been  discus- 
sing. Let  us  fix  all  three  in  our  minds,  and  hold  them  there 
firmly :  — 

I.  We  have  as  immediate  an  experience  of  physical  phe- 
nomena as  we  have  of  mental. 


126  The   World  We  Live  In 

2.  We  must  not  put  mental  phenomena  into  the  body,  and 
thus  make  them  physical. 

3.  We  must  not  fall  into  the  error  of  supposing  that  physical 
phenomena,  merely  because  they  are  phenomena,  must  be 
something  mental. 

As  the  reader  must  have  seen,  the  crucial  point  of  my  whole 
discussion  is  just  this  :  Is  the  physical  directly  revealed  in  expe- 
rience, or  is  it  not  ?  I  think  I  have  shown  in  this  chapter  that 
it  is,  and  that  it  is  quite  possible  to  distinguish  between  expe- 
rience of  the  psychical  and  of  the  physical.  For  this  I  need  not 
claim  any  extraordinary  amount  of  credit.  We  are  all  making 
the  distinction  every  day,  without  giving  the  matter  a  thought ; 
and,  on  the  whole,  we  make  it  very  well.  A  stately  row  of 
sciences  stands  before  us,  and  warns  us  away  from  the  path 
of  error. 

And  if  this  fundamental  question  is  answered  in  the  affirma- 
tive, there  ought  to  remain  no  difliculties  which  are  a  genuine 
menace  to  the  physical  world,  which  we  all  instinctively  accept, 
and  in  which  we  recognize  that  we  have  a  place,  and  a  modest 
one.  Thus,  we  may  freely  admit  that  but  little  of  the  physical 
world  is  revealed  to  us  directly  at  any  given  time.  Does  that 
imply  that  we  may  not,  by  inference  from  what  is  thus  revealed, 
know  more  of  it  indirectly,  and  know  it  as  physical  ?  As  well 
maintain  that,  because  the  experiences  which  I  had  during 
my  childhood  are  not  experienced  now,  I  cannot  know  that  I 
had  the  experiences.  We  are  concerned  here  with  nothing  that 
touches  the  distinction  between  physical  and  mental ;  we  are 
concerned  with  the  general  problem  of  representative  knowl- 
edge, which  touches  as  nearly  the  world  of  mind  as  the  world 
of  matter."* 

Now,  the  philosopher  who  stands  unequivocally  with  common 
thought  and  with  science  in  recognizing  that  the  physical  must  he 
treated  as  physical,  and  must  not  he  transmuted  into  something  that 
is  mental,  is  a  Realist.     If  he  has  risen  to  the  conception  that  the 


The   World  of  the  New  Realism  127 

World  is  Phenomenon,  he  is  a  Modern  Realist,  and  is  with  the 
Kant  of  the  ^^  Refutation" 

On  the  other  hand,  he  who  insists  that  what  is  phenomenon  is 
necessarily  mental,  is  not  with  Kant,  and  he  has  lifted  up  his 
heel  against  the  plain  man  and  the  man  of  science.  That  he 
has  with  him  an  ancient  tradition  is  cold  comfort.  We  have 
seen  in  Chapter  II  that  the  ancient  tradition  first  seduced  men 
into  strange  paths,  and  then  robbed  them  of  their  world  as 
Kant  was  not  willing  to  be  robbed. 

In  this  chapter  I  have  developed  freely  the  doctrine  of  the 
World  as  Phenomenon.  How  much  of  what  I  have  written 
may  I  justly  lay  at  the  doors  of  Kant  ? 

On  this  point  opinions  will  differ.  Nevertheless,  there  are 
certain  things  upon  which  there  ought  to  be  no  difference  of 
opinion  in  unprejudiced  minds  acquainted  with  the  facts. 
These  are :  — 

1.  Kant  pointed  out  that  in  all  our  inquiries  about  the  world 
we  are  concerned  only  with  phenomena. 

2.  He  claimed  that  we  are  as  directly  aware  of  physical 
phenomena  as  of  mental. 

3.  He  cherished  a  Hvely  antipathy  to  ''idealism  proper" 
and  regarded  it  as  an  "extravagant"  doctrine. 

4.  He  had  no  disposition  to  turn  the  physical  phenomena 
revealed  to  him  into  ideas  in  his  own  mind. 

5.  He  did  not  identify  them  with  ideas  in  some  other  mind. 
In  this  last  respect  Kant  contrasts  markedly  with  certain  of 

his  successors.  Whatever  one  may  think  of  the  worth  of  the 
ingenious  reasonings  by  which  he  would  persuade  us  of  the 
existence  of  God,  we  must  admit  that  he,  at  least,  does  not  buy 
a  god  cheap  by  the  simple  expedient  of  bestowing  an  inappro- 
priate name  upon  the  physical  world  of  which  we  have  expe- 
rience. He  does  not  argue :  The  World  is  Phenomenon, 
hence,  it  is  Idea  or  Reason,  and  may  properly  be  regarded  as 
Divine.     A  certain  healthy  instinct  led  him  to  cling  tenaciously, 


128  The  World  We  Live  ht 

notwithstanding  the  embarrassment  occasioned  by  the  creaking 
and  groaning  of  the  elaborate  machinery  of  the  "Critique 
of  Pure  Reason,"  to  the  recognition  of  the  fact  that  the  world 
is  just  the  world,  and  that,  when  we  call  it  "phenomenon,"  we 
are  only  pointing  out  that  it  is  the  world  we  know.  If  a 
physical  system  of  things  is  revealed,  then,  by  all  means,  let 
us  accept  it  and  treat  it  as  such. 

And  if  we  do  accept  it  and  treat  it  as  such,  the  many  aspects 
or  revelations  of  the  world  discussed  in  the  last  chapter  are  not 
left  at  loose  ends  and  without  intelhgible  relation  to  each  other. 
They  belong  to  one  world-system,  and  may  be  assigned  their 
place.  Pharaoh's  dream,  the  ambition  of  Alexander,  the  re- 
morse of  Augustine,  the  learning  of  St.  Thomas,  the  thoughts 
which  have  passed  through  my  mind  in  writing  this  chapter,  the 
sensations  of  the  man  I  see  across  the  way,  the  psychic  life  of 
the  dog  that  lies  at  my  feet  or  of  the  fly  that  buzzes  in  the  sum- 
mer air  —  these  do  not  constitute  a  chaos.  The  attention  that 
these  things  and  such  as  these  have  attracted  from  men,  the 
treatment  which  has  actually  been  accorded  to  them,  indicate 
that  they  are  given  a  place  in  an  orderly  world.  Let  one  try 
to  assign  them  such  a  place,  let  one  try  to  make  intelligible 
what  is  meant  by  their  standing  in  relation  to  each  other,  and 
let  one  do  this  while  consistently  ignoring  the  physical  world  of 
things,  times,  and  places  !    The  attempt  is  hopeless. 


CHAPTER  X 

THE  WORLD  WITHOUT  AXD  THE  WORLD  WITHIN 

There  is  nothing  to  prevent  a  man  from  being  a  realist  and, 
at  the  same  time,  a  haloed  saint ;  on  the  other  hand,  a  man  may- 
be a.  reahst  and  yet  quite  capable  of  steahng  a  sheep.  Every- 
body who  accepts  a  World  Without  and  does  not  try  to  drag 
it  "inside,"  turning  it  into  his  own  idea  or  the  idea  of  some  one 
else,  is  a  realist  of  some  sort.  There  are  those  —  and  they 
comprise  much  the  larger  number  —  who  are  unconscious 
reahsts,  recognizing  the  physical  world  naively,  and  laying' 
claim  to  no  philosophical  doctrine.  There  are  those  who  are 
reahsts  consciously  and  after  serious  reflection. 

When  we  call  a  man  a  reahst,  we  distinguish  him  from  the 
ideahst,  but  we  do  not  completely  describe  him.  He  may  be 
an  Old-fashioned  Reahst,  and  hold  to  the  Duplicate  World 
discussed  in  Chapter  II ;  or  he  may  be  a  New  Reahst,  and 
accept  the  World  as  Phenomenon.  In  either  case,  while 
insisting  strenuously  that  the  external  world  must  be  kept 
external,  he  may  feel  impehed  to  ask  himself  rather  anxiously 
just  what  it  is  reasonable  to  regard  as  existing  in  the  external 
world,  and  what  should  be  regarded  as  existing  only  in  the 
mind. 

We  have  seen  (Chapter  II)  that,  very  early  in  the  history 
of  speculative  thought,  men  came  to  the  conclusion  that  things 
are  not  precisely  as  they  seem.  The  man  who  walked  the 
streets  of  Abdera  or  of  Athens  saw  the  objects  about  him  stand 
out  sharply  contrasted  in  color,  bathed  in  the  hght  of  the 
blazing  sun.  He  was  told  by  the  sages  that  nothing  really 
existed  outside  of    him  save    atoms    and    void    space.     He 

K  129 


130  The   World  We  Live  I, 


n 


gathered  up  the  splendid  vision  and  drew  it  within,  becoming, 
in  his  enlightenment,  the  forerunner  of  such  as,  in  later  ages, 
distinguished  between  the  primary  qualities  of  bodies  and  the 
secondary,  attributing  the  former  to  the  objects  themselves, 
and  declaring  the  latter  to  be  "  nothing  in  the  objects  them- 
selves, but  powers  to  produce  various  sensations  in  us  by 
their  primary  qualities."  To  the  mind  of  the  Enghsh 
reader  there  will  at  once  occur,  in  this  connection,  Locke's 
classical  denudation  of  the  physical  world:  "The  particular 
bulk,  number,  figure,  and  motion  of  the  parts  of  fire,  or  snow, 
are  really  in  them,  whether  any  one's  senses  perceive  them  or 
no ;  and  therefore  they  may  be  called  real  qualities,  because 
they  really  exist  in  those  bodies ;  but  hght,  heat,  whiteness  or 
coldness,  are  no  more  really  in  them  than  sickness  or  pain  is  in 
manna.  Take  away  the  sensation  of  them ;  let  not  the  eyes 
see  light  or  colors,  nor  the  ears  hear  sounds ;  let  the  palate  not 
taste,  nor  the  nose  smell ;  and  all  colors,  tastes,  odors,  and  sounds 
as  they  are  such  particular  ideas,  vanish  and  cease,  and  are 
reduced  to  their  causes,  i.e.  bulk,  figure,  and  motion  of  parts."  ^ 
Locke  has  scraped  the  world  —  he  has  taken  off  certain  of 
the  properties  men  generally  are  inchned  to  allow  it,  but  he 
has  permitted  it  to  retain  certain  others.  We  saw  in  Chapter 
II  that  it  is  quite  possible  to  go  farther  in  this  direction.  That 
the  plain  man,  ancient  or  modern,  is  a  reaHst,  we  must  admit ; 
that  Locke  and  such  as  he  are  realists  of  a  sort  appears  as  un- 
deniable. But  what  shall  we  call  the  man  who  scours  the  world 
with  such  energy  that  he  leaves  it  with  no  surface  at  all  ?  How 
shall  we  label  the  philosopher  to  whom  it  has  become  a  mere 
"Thing-in-itself "  or  an  "Unknowable"?  Of  his  world  we 
must  say,  that  his  breath  has  passed  over  it,  and  it  is  gone,  and 
the  place  thereof  shall  know  it  no  more  —  indeed,  its  place  has 
vanished  with  it.  Such  a  man  is  not  a  realist.  He  is  one 
standing  in  the  afterglow  of  a  realism  which  has  dipped  below 
the  horizon  and  has  disappeared. 


The   World  Without  and  tJie   World  Within    131 

In  this  chapter  I  shall  not  dwell  upon  the  Old-fashioned 
Reahst.  As  he  does  not  appear  to  have  any  logical  right  to 
his  Duphcate  World,  but  may  fairly  be  said  to  have  stolen 
it,  we  may  leave  him  to  put  into  it  or  to  take  out  of  it  what  he 
pleases.  When  we  are  talking  about  a  world  which  Hes,  by 
hypothesis,  wholly  beyond  our  experience,  verification  seems  to 
be  out  of  the  question,  and  there  is  no  natural  Hmit  to  dispute. 

Let  us  turn  to  the  New  Realist,  to  whom  the  world  is  the 
World  as  Phenomenon.  We  have  seen  that  he  must  recog- 
nize something  revealed  in  experience  as  external,  or  he  is  left 
without  any  world  at  all.  He  may,  however,  ask  in  all  se- 
riousness :  What  sort  of  phenomena  may  I  properly  call  exter- 
nal, and  what  must  I  regard  as  internal  and  subjective  ?  It  is 
conceivable  that  among  New  Realists  there  should  be  a  differ- 
ence of  opinion  upon  the  point  at  issue. 

In  considering  this  problem,  let  us  cast  a  critical  glance  upon 
the  things  about  us  as  they  appear  to  be  revealed  in  our  expe- 
rience. That  we  have  experience  of  things  and  of  the  changes 
which  take  place  in  them  it  is  hard  not  to  believe,  and  it  seems 
indubitable  that  things  are  revealed  under  a  variety  of 
guises  by  the  several  senses. 

The  illustration  of  the  woodman  and  the  tree  had  reference 
especially  to  the  sense  of  sight,  but  we  become  aware  of  things 
and  their  quahties  in  other  ways  as  well.  I  can  close  my  eyes 
and  pass  my  finger  over  the  surface  of  the  table  before  me ;  I 
can  Hsten  to  the  sounds  wafted  from  the  bell  in  the  distant 
tower;  I  can  reject  as  suspicious  the  morsel  of  game  that  I 
was  about  to  put  into  my  mouth ;  I  can  complain  that  salt  has 
been  put  into  my  coffee  instead  of  sugar. 

If  I  examine  common  speech  to  discover  how  men  usually 
treat  the  qualities  of  things  revealed  by  the  senses,  I  find  that 
they  have  no  hesitation  in  referring  many  sorts  of  qualities  to 
external  things,  and  in  speaking  as  though  these  qualities  were 
quite  as  external  as  the  things  and  quite  as  independent  of  us. 


132  The   World  We  Live  In 

Thus,  no  one  hesitates  to  say  that  the  coat  of  the  woodman  is 
brown  and  the  leaves  of  the  tree  are  green ;  that  the  surface  of 
my  table  is  smooth,  hard,  and  continuous,  as  it  feels,  not  per- 
forated with  holes ;  that  the  sound  of  the  bell  is  very  loud  in  the 
belfry,  but  is  mufifled  here  in  my  room;  that  the  rose  is  fra- 
grant, and  that  the  apple  is  sweet  or  sour. 

That  men  do  express  themselves  in  this  way  cannot  be  matter 
of  dispute.  They  talk  as  though  not  merely  texture  and  hard- 
ness, but  colors,  sounds,  odors,  and  sweetness  or  saltness,  as 
well,  had  a  place  in  the  physical  world,  and  were  not  fugitive 
existences  that  spring  into  being  in  the  mind  on  the  making 
of  certain  physical  contacts  in  a  world  in  which  none  of  these 
quahties  have  any  existence.  And  if  we  ask  men  how  they 
are  in  the  habit  of  thinlcing  of  such  things,  we  shall  find  that 
the  expressions  wliich  they  employ  fairly  represent  their 
thought.  To  them,  a  smooth  surface  is  smooth,  a  red  book 
is  red,  a  rose  is  fragrant,  sugar  is  sweet.  This  habit  of  thought 
is  not  confined  wholly  to  the  unlearned.  As  I  look  about  the 
room  in  which  I  am  writing,  and  reflect  upon  the  way  in  which 
I  am  impressed  by  what  meets  my  view,  I  discover  that  I 
have  no  disposition  to  split  the  chair  against  the  wall  opposite 
me  into  a  colored  apparition  "within"  and  a  colorless  form 
"without."  The  things  which  I  seem  to  perceive  around  me 
do  not  present  themselves  as  the  pallid  specters  one  might 
expect  to  meet  could  one  penetrate  to  the  colorless  external 
world  of  Locke's  "Essay."  When  I  talk  about  a  chair,  I 
think  of  a  chair  as  it  looks  and  feels.  It  is  this  chair  that  pre- 
sents itself  as  outside  of  me,  in  space,  against  my  wall ;  I  see 
it  to  be  colored,  I  can  approach  it,  I  can  touch  it.  Why  rob  it 
of  one  quality  rather  than  of  another  ? 

Men  do,  then,  talk  as  though  colors,  odors,  and  such, 
actually  belonged  to  things ;  and  even  those  who  have  had  the 
pleasure  of  reading  the  philosophers  are  apt  to  share  their 
habits  of  thought  and  speech.     Shall  we  hold  that  the  scholar 


The   World  WitJiout  and  the   World  Within      133 

who  thus  falls  into  line  with  the  plain  man  has  succumbed  to  a 
weakness,  natural  to  the  unreflective,  but  not  to  be  justified 
before  the  bar  of  reason  ?  Shall  we  advise  him  to  adjust  him- 
self to  accepted  modes  of  speech  as  a  matter  of  convenience, 
but  to  avoid  thinking  of  such  a  quality  as  color  as  really  out- 
side and  independent  of  perception  ?  There  are  certain  points 
to  which,  before  we  read  him  this  lecture,  we  should  give  care- 
ful consideration. 

In  the  first  place  we  should  reflect  upon  the  fact  that,  al- 
though it  is  not  worth  while  to  ask  the  plain  man  to  describe 
what  he  is  doing  when  he  is  making  his  distinctions,  it  may  very 
well  be  that  the  distinctions  which  he  actually  makes  are  real 
and  important  ones,  and  that  the  language  in  which  he  marks 
them  is  entirely  justified.  The  distinction  between  what  is 
or  happens  in  the  external  world  and  what  is  or  happens  in 
ourselves  is  one  which  concerns  human  life  very  nearly.  As 
we  have  seen  in  the  illustration  of  the  woodman  and  the  tree, 
we  are  constantly  making  use  of  the  distinction,  and  it  would 
result  in  measureless  confusion  did  we  suddenly  find  ourselves 
unable  to  distinguish  between  subjective  and  objective,  changes 
in  our  percepts  and  changes  in  things.  Since  the  distinction  is 
so  significant  and  so  useful,  it  would  be  surprising  if  men,  on 
the  whole,  made  it  badly.  That  confusion  is  possible  some- 
times is  admitted  on  the  street  as  well  as  in  the  laboratorv ; 
but  it  is  accepted  that  confusion  is  to  be  regarded  as  the  excep- 
tion, and  not  as  the  rule. 

In  the  second  place,  it  is  worthy  of  note  that  science  thinks 
the  thoughts  and  speaks  the  language  of  the  plain  man,  when 
science  is  concerned  with  those  things  that  fall  under  the 
cognizance  of  the  senses.  Sometimes  science  gives  us  infor- 
mation regarding  what  does  not  and  cannot  present  itself  to 
the  senses  at  all.  But  when  it  is  dealing  with  the  things 
that  we  find  about  us  in  common  fife,  it  speaks  of  them  as  we 
all  do. 


134  1^^^^   World  We  Live  In 

We  are  told,  for  example,  that :  "Corpuscles  cause  chemical 
changes  in  certain  bodies  on  which  they  fall.  Thus,  rock 
salt  takes  a  beautiful  violet  color,  which,  unless  exposed  to 
moisture,  it  will  retain  for  years.  Lithium  chloride  is  remark- 
ably sensitive  to  the  impact  of  corpuscles.  If  a  beam  of  cor- 
puscles be  slowly  moved  over  the  salt  by  a  magnet,  the  path  of 
the  beam  traces  out  a  colored  band  on  the  surface  of  the  salt." 
Or,  again,  we  hear  that:  "Eecquerel  rays  cause  chemical  ac- 
tion. Emitted  from  radium  they  will  discolor  paper,  cause 
glass  to  take  a  violet  tint,  turn  oxygen  into  ozone,  yellow 
phosphorus  into  red  phosphorus,  mercury  perchloride  into 
calomel  and  will  decompose  iodoform." 

We  hear,  then,  even  when  we  listen  to  the  man  of  science, 
that,  under  given  circumstances,  rock  salt  takes  a  violet  color 
which  it  may  retain  for  years ;  that  a  colored  band  may  be 
produced  on  a  lithium  salt ;  that,  in  the  presence  of  radium, 
paper  will  be  discolored,  glass  take  a  violet  tint,  and  yellow 
phosphorus  become  red  phosphorus.  This  Is  the  language  of 
one  talking  about  things  outside,  not  about  mxntal  phenomena. 
The  expressions  used,  which  carry  an  unmistakable  suggestion, 
serve  the  purposes  of  science,  as  well  as  the  uses  of  common  life. 
Did  they  not  serve  their  purpose  well,  such  expressions  would 
be  discarded. 

This  brings  me  to  my  third  point.  We  have  seen  that  those 
who  insist  that  such  qualities  as  color  must  be  in  the  mind  and 
not  outside  cannot  fall  back  upon  the  common  experience  of 
mankind,  for  its  testimony  seems  to  be  against  them ;  nor  can 
they  urge  the  involuntary  admissions  of  the  scientific,  for  the 
scientific,  when  dealing  with  the  things  we  perceive  about  us, 
talk  as  if  these  things  were  just  what  they  seem  to  be,  and 
tricked  out  with  all  sorts  of  qualities.  They  seem,  then,  com- 
pelled to  take  their  stand  on  the  position  that  there  is  a  cer- 
tain incongruity  in  the  external  existence  of  such  phenomena 
as  colors,  sounds,  odors. 


The   World  Without  and  the   World  Within     135 

Certainly  no  man  is  born  with  the  knowledge  that  it  is  un- 
natural for  such  phenomena  to  exist  outside.  He  who  is 
assured  of  that  fact  has  either  made  that  discovery  for  him- 
self, or  he  has  picked  up  the  information  from  some  one  else 
—  presumably  from  some  philosopher.  In  any  case  we  can- 
not permit  his  assertion  to  pass  unchallenged.  It  does  not 
strike  most  men  as  unnatural  that  a  red  book  should  really 
be  red  or  a  rose  really  fragrant.  It  does  not  seem  monstrous 
that  the  color  of  the  book  should  fade  through  exposure  to  sun- 
light. He  who  maintains  that  such  things  are  contrary  to 
nature  should  be  compelled  to  prove  his  point.  And  any 
intelligent  discussion  of  the  question  whether  such  phenomena 
as  we  are  considering  should  or  should  not  be  regarded  as  exist- 
ing outside,  seems  to  bring  us  back  unavoidably  to  the  pre- 
liminary question  :  What  have  we  a  right  to  mean  when  we  say 
that  anything  whatever  exists  outside  ?  Until  the  meaning  of 
the  word  "outside"  is  made  quite  clear,  we  are  evidently  wan- 
dering in  the  dark  and  talking  at  random. 

What  is  meant  by  the  external  world  and  the  existence  of 
any  phenomenon  in  the  external  world,  I  examined  at  length 
in  the  last  chapter.  I  shall  beg  the  reader  to  bear  in  mind  what 
was  said  there ;  and,  in  the  Hght  of  it,  I  shall  inquire  whether 
there  is  any  reason  why  such  phenomena  as  colors,  sounds, 
odors,  should  not  be  external  in  the  only  sense  of  the  word  in 
which  we  have  any  reason  to  regard  anything  at  all  as  physical 
and  external.  But  first  I  shall  set  up  a  hypothetical  scare- 
crow, to  warn  us  away  effectively  from  ground  upon  which  we 
should  not  allow  ourselves  to  settle. 

Let  us  suppose  that  Descartes  was  right  in  assigning  to  the 
mind  —  I  need  not  here  pause  to  discuss  the  word  —  a  seat 
in  the  pineal  gland  in  the  brain.  Let  us  suppose  that  every- 
thing internal,  sensations,  percepts,  memories,  judgments, 
emotions,  and  the  like,  is  unequivocally  somewhere  in  the 
gland ;  in  it,  as  papers  are  in  this  desk,  or  as  chairs  are  in  this 


I  ''6  The   World  We  Live  In 


J 


room.  Let  us  suppose  that  the  gland,  the  brain  in  which  it  has 
its  place,  the  nerves,  the  sense-organs,  and  the  whole  physical 
world  to  which  such  thmgs  belong,  are  to  be  regarded  as  lying 
around  the  spot  in  which  mental  phenomena  are  segregated. 
Finally,  let  us  make  the  monstrous  supposition  that  we  have 
discovered  some  ingem'ous  way  of  inspecting  directly  both  the 
mental  phenomena  in  the  gland  and  the  physical  world  in  which 
we  have  located  their  diminutive  prison. 

Under  these  circumstances,  we  find  the  significance  of  the 
words  "inside"  and  "outside"  very  easy  to  grasp.  "Inside" 
means  "in  the  particular  spot  "  ;  "outside "  means  "in  the  space 
beyond  it."  Our  inspection  reveals  that  what  is  within  is  not 
precisely  like  what  is  without.  For  one  thing,  colors,  sounds, 
odors,  tastes,  have  their  place  only  in  the  little  world  of  ideas. 
What  is  without  has  no  color,  does  not  emit  sound,  is  odorless, 
is  tasteless.  Nevertheless,  when  something  happens  outside, 
there  appear  in  the  gland,  among  the  ideas,  phenomena  quite 
dift'erent  in  kind  from  anything  outside.  The  imprisoned  soul 
we  are  discussing  seems  to  hear  the  ringing  of  a  bell,  it  seems  to 
see  the  rosy  light  of  dawn,  it  deludes  itself  with  the  thought 
that  the  scent  of  the  roses  is  blown  when  the  breeze  of  the 
morning  moves.  It  decks  a  dark  and  silent  world  with  a  man- 
tle of  light  and  of  harmony,  and  it  rejoices  in  the  beauty  of 
what  it  has  itself  unwittingly  called  into  being. 

What  a  travesty  of  human  experience  of  the  mind  and  the 
world  is  furnished  us  in  this  picture  !  Yet  those  who  read  the 
works  of  the  philosophers  know  that  not  a  few  of  them  have 
suggested  to  us  that  we  should  conceive  of  the  World  Without 
and  the  World  Within  somewhat  after  this  fashion.  This,  too, 
in  the  face  of  the  patent  fact  that,  in  all  our  actual  experience 
of  our  minds  and  of  physical  tilings,  there  is  nothing  in  the 
faintest  degree  suggesting  it.  We  do  not  perceive  our  ideas 
to  be  "inside,"  in  this  extraordinary  sense  of  the  word,  or  in 
any  sense  at  all  approaching  it.     We  seem  to  perceive  meadow 


The  World  Without  and  the   World  Within     137 

and  grove,  river  and  mountain,  where  they  are  and  as  they  are.* 
We  are  plainly  doing  violence  to  our  experience  when  we  aban- 
don the  common  light  of  day,  in  which  as  plain  men  we  have 
heretofore  walked,  for  this  twihght  of  the  gods,  in  which  all 
values  are  re-valued  and  most  values  are  lost.  Little  wonder 
that  we  are  advised  to  speak  as  do  other  men,  whatever  may  be 
our  private  convictions  touching  the  world  and  our  knowledge 
of  it! 

Away  with  the  unnatural  picture,  and  back  to  the  physical 
and  the  mental  as  they  appear  to  be  unmistakably  revealed  in 
our  experience.  In  the  illustration  of  the  woodcutter  and 
the  tree,  we  saw  that  there  was  no  great  difficulty  in  deciding 
whether  we  were  concerned  with  a  change  in  things  or  with  a 
change  in  ideas.  If  we  approach  the  man  and  the  tree,  there 
is  a  change  in  our  experiences,  but  we  do  not  say  that  the  things 
have  changed,  we  say  that  they  look  different  from  different 
positions.  If  the  relation  of  the  sense-organ  to  the  objects 
remains  unchanged,  we  say  that  the  changes  which  take 
place  —  the  swing  of  the  ax,  the  flying  of  the  chip  —  are 
changes  in  things.  Evidently,  inside  and  outside,  in  the  mind 
and  in  the  physical  world,  are  not  here  expressions  equivalent 
to  in  the  body  and  outside  of  the  body.  Just  as  evidently,  the 
man  who  distinguishes  between  a  change  in  his  percepts  and  a 
change  in  things  does  not  split  what  he  perceives  at  any  moment 
into  two  parts,  drawing  one  part  "within  "  and  leaving  the  other 
part  "  without."  When  we  reflect  upon  what  it  means  to 
refer  phenomena  to  the  external  world  or  to  refer  them  to  the 
mind,  as  illustrated  in  the  very  commonplace  experience  which 
I  have  instanced,  we  see  that  there  seems  to  be  no  reason  what- 
ever why  colors  should  not  be  as  susceptible  of  this  dual  refer- 
ence as  any  other  phenomena. 

As  I  approach  the  woodcutter  from  a  distance,  the  color  of 
his  coat  does  not  appear  to  me  just  the  same  at  every  stage  of 

*  See  Chapter  XI,  pp.  157  ff. 


138  The   World  We  Live  In 

my  progress.  When  I  stand  near  him,  I  see  clearly  that  it  is 
brown,  and  I  have  a  nice  perception  of  the  particular  shade  of 
brown  which  belongs  to  it.  But  it  does  not  occur  to  me  to 
say  that  the  coat  has  turned  brown  as  I  walked ;  nor  would  it 
occur  to  me  to  say  that  the  tree  which  seemed  blue  at  a  dis- 
tance has  turned  green  on  my  approach.  On  the  other  hand, 
I  have  no  hesitation  in  saying  that  some  objects  change  their 
color.  The  apples  which  hang  upon  the  bough  outside  of  my 
window  are  redder  than  they  were  a  week  ago.  They  have 
turned  red.  The  garment  I  sent  to  the  dyer  comes  back  to 
me  different  in  color.  The  iridescent  hues  of  the  soap  bubble 
keep  shifting,  and  I  do  not  attribute  their  change  to  my  organs 
of  vision  or  to  the  relation  of  these  to  the  airy  globe  which 
shines  before  me. 

We  may  reason  in  the  same  way  about  sounds,  odors,  and 
tastes.  It  is  not  merely  a  concession  to  common  usage,  but  it 
is  a  just  recognition  of  familiar  distinctions,  to  say :  that  the 
bell  rings  loudly  in  the  belfry,  although  the  sounds  seem 
mufHed  here  where  I  sit ;  that  the  sounds  are  not  annihilated 
when  I  stop  my  ears  with  my  fingers ;  that,  when  the  tumul- 
tuous clamor  comes  to  an  end,  and  the  bell  is  heard  to  toll 
slowly,  the  fact  is  to  be  attributed  to  changes  in  the  outside 
world,  and  does  not  find  its  explanation  in  any  reference  to  my 
organs  of  hearing. 

We  notice  the  scent  of  flowers  in  the  room  through  which  we 
are  passing,  and  we  approach  the  vase  which  contains  them. 
The  odor  is  more  noticeable ;  and,  as  we  bend  over  the  vase, 
it  is  more  pronounced  still.  No  one  judges  that  the  scent  of 
the  flowers  has  becomiC  more  powerful.  Nor  is  any  thoughtful 
man  likely  to  decide  that  flowers  lose  their  scent  when  he  suffers 
from  a  cold  in  the  head,  and  regain  it  when  he  has  appHed  to 
himself  the  proper  remedies.  A  flower  may  lose  its  scent,  or 
we  may  be  so  circumstanced  that  we  cannot  perceive  the  scent 
that  it  has.  In  most  instances  it  does  not  seem  impossible  to 
decide  which  is  the  case. 


The   World  Without  aizd  the   World  Within     139 

Nor  is  it  otherwise  with  the  sweetness,  saltness,  sourness  or 
bitterness  of  substances  which  we  put  into  our  mouths.  He 
who  has  been  eating  sugar  may  declare  that  the  sup  of  tea 
which  he  takes  has  no  sweetness  at  all ;  just  as  he  who  enters  a 
darkened  room  from  the  sun-illumined  street  may  declare  that 
he  is  enveloped  in  total  darkness.  The  effect  produced  upon 
our  perception  of  tastes  by  the  fluctuation  in  the  condition  of 
our  bodies  was  a  subject  of  comment  at  least  two  thousand 
years  ago.  Nevertheless,  it  has  been  quite  possible  for  man- 
kind to  classify  substances  according  to  their  tastes,  and  even 
to  form  intelligent  judgments  as  to  the  degree  of  their  sweet- 
ness or  saltness. 

There  seems,  then,  no  reason  why  we  should  not  distinguish 
between  inner  and  outer,  subjective  and  objective,  when  we  are 
deahng  with  colors,  sounds,  odors,  and  tastes.  In  fact,  we 
every  day  do  thus  distinguish,  and  the  language  in  which  we 
express  ourselves  is  rather  accurately  adjusted  to  the  distinc- 
tions which  we  actually  find  it  necessary  to  make.  He  who 
enters  a  darkened  room  does  not  assume  that  he  cannot  be 
seen,  merely  because  he  cannot  see ;  he  who  hears  no  words 
pronounced  does  not  necessarily  take  that  bare  fact  as  evi- 
dence that  no  one  is  talking  and  no  one  is  hearing ;  he  who  buys 
flowers  to  send  to  his  lady  does  not  overlook  the  distinction 
between  scented  and  scentless,  merely  because,  in  his  present 
condition,  he  cannot  distinguish  by  smell  a  rose  from  a  dahlia ; 
the  thoughtful  host  leaves  out  of  consideration  the  fact  that  he 
has  a  disordered  body,  and  he  chooses  wines  and  viands  on  the 
assumption  that  the  tastes  of  things  differ  and  that  these  differ- 
ences can  be  distinguished  by  men  generally. 

The  distinction  between  what  belongs  to  the  object  in  ques- 
tion, and  what  must  find  its  explanation  in  us  or  in  our  relation 
to  the  object,  is  not  affected  by  such  considerations  as  that  the 
colors  of  things  are  not  independent  of  the  light  under  which 
they  are  seen,  and  are  constantly  changing.     We  call  a  cer- 


140  The   World  We  Live  In 

tain  book  red,  and  we  even  specify  the  shade  of  red ;  we  say 
that  snow  is  wliite.  But  the  passing  of  a  cloud  sensibly  modi- 
fies the  color  of  every  object  in  my  room,  and  the  peak  which 
stood  out  white  under  the  noon  sun  turns  pink  at  sunset. 
These  are  objective  changes  of  color.  Nevertheless,  we  con- 
tinue to  call  the  book  red  and  snow  white ;  and  even  after 
the  shades  of  night  have  fallen  and  all  things  have  disappeared 
in  indistinguishable  darkness,  we  talk  as  though  each  object 
had  its  color  and  the  one  color.  Manifestly,  we  are  here  con- 
cerned with  matters  of  convenience  and  convention.  In 
each  instance  cited  there  has  been  an  objective  change,  but  it 
is  not  necessary  to  indicate  every  objective  change  of  color 
by  giving  a  distinct  name  to  the  thing  perceived.  Some 
changes  have  Httle  significance,  and  may  be  allowed  to  pass 
unnoted.  This  does  not  mean  that  objects  have  no  color. 
It  is,  however,  possible  to  urge  a  point  which  seems  much 
more  worthy  of  consideration.  We  have  seen  that,  in  the  only 
sense  of  the  word  "external"  that  seems  to  be  significant, 
colors,  sounds,  odors,  and  tastes  appear  to  have  as  good  a  right 
to  be  considered  external  as  have  any  other  phenomena. 
Nevertheless,  it  may  be  claimed,  all  the  facts  adduced  are  com- 
patible with  the  doctrine  that  they  are  only  mental  signs  of 
something  external,  signs  which  are  to  be  depended  on,  and 
which  unfaihngly  indicate  that  something  is  taking  place  in 
the  physical  world,  but  which  cannot  themselves  be  said  to 
belong  to  the  physical  world  at  all.  Admitting  that  both 
common  sense  and  science  find  their  purposes  best  served  by 
talking  as  though  rock  salt  really  could  take  on  and  retain  a 
violet  tint,  and  that  such  language  is,  hence,  justified,  is  it  not, 
at  least,  conceivable  that  all  such  expressions  may  need  a  cer- 
tain interpretation  if  misunderstanding  is  to  be  avoided? 
A  bank  note  is  as  good  as  gold  for  all  practical  purposes,  if  it 
truly  represents  the  amount  of  gold  indicated  by  the  figures 
printed  upon  it.     One  makes  no  financial  blunder  in  treating  it 


The   World   Without  and  the    World   Within     141 

as  though  it  were  the  thing  it  represents.  And  if  such  a 
quality  as  color  be  but  an  inner  sign  of  something  itself  exter- 
nal, what  matter  whether  we  mark  in  speech  the  fact  that  it  is 
a  mere  sign,  or  whether  we  proceed  with  our  discussion  in  in- 
difference to  the  fact  ?  If  the  relation  between  sign  and  thing 
signified  be  dependable,  our  accounts  need  not  be  thrown  into 
disorder.  Nevertheless,  say  those  who  reason  thus,  paper  is 
not  a  metal,  and  it  is  an  error  to  suppose  that  it  is  gold ;  like- 
wise, it  is  an  error  to  suppose  that  colors  are  external. 

I  might  answer  all  this  briefly  by  pointing  out  that  it  seems 
reasonable  to  call  external  any  phenomena  to  which  will  apply 
satisfactorily  the  only  criterion  of  externality  that  we  have. 
But  so  strong  is  the  prejudice  against  the  externaUty  of  the  so- 
called  secondary  quaUties  of  bodies,  on  the  part  of  certain  plii- 
losophers,  at  least,  and  so  natural  does  the  objection  brought 
forward  above  seem  to  many  persons,  that  I  shall  give  the  mat- 
ter a  more  detailed  consideration. 

At  the  outset,  I  must  call  attention  to  the  fact  that  he  who 
thus  lays  emphasis  upon  internal  signs  and  external  things 
signified  by  them  seems  forced  to  maintain  that  no  phenomenon 
directly  presented  in  our  experience  is  to  be  regarded  as  exter- 
nal at  all.  The  surface  of  my  writing  table  looks  colored,  it 
seems  to  fill  continuously  the  space  that  it  occupies,  it  feels  to 
the  touch  smooth.  Why  not  attribute  all  these  qualities  to 
the  constitution  of  my  organs  of  sense,  and  say  that  it  is  not 
really  colored,  does  not  really  fill  space  continuously,  and  is  not 
smooth,  but  is  rather  rough  and  uneven  ?  So  much  one  may 
say  even  without  having  recourse  to  the  ultimate  constituents 
of  things  as  the  chemist  and  the  physicist  describe  them. 

One  may,  however,  go  farther.  No  man  has  a  right,  on  the 
basis  of  this  or  that  philosophic  theory,  to  reject  the  accepted 
facts  of  science  or  what  seem  to  be  legitimate  inferences  from 
those  facts.  For  a  century  the  science  of  chemistry  has  been 
famihar  with  the  atom,  and  has  conceived  of  the  material 


142  The   World  We  Live  In 

things  which  surround  us  as  composed  of  these  minute  and 
imperceptible  entities  in  their  various  combinations.  The 
most  recent  physical  researches  have  familiarized  us  with  the 
concept  of  the  corpuscle  or  electron,  that  exceedingly  minute 
constituent  of  the  atom,  the  nature  and  behavior  of  which 
are  supposed  to  account  for  the  properties  of  the  atom,  just  as 
the  nature  and  behavior  of  the  atom  are  supposed  to  account 
for  the  properties  of  the  things  we  see  and  feel. 

If  these  doctrines  of  the  constitution  of  matter  are  true  — 
and  certainly  the  layman  has  no  right  to  impugn  their  truth 
—  must  we  not  maintain  that  no  phenomenon  directly  revealed 
to  the  sense  is  to  be  regarded  as  external,  but  that  the  only 
external  world  is  the  world  of  atoms  and  corpuscles  and  their 
motions  ?  Now,  we  have  long  heard  of  atomic  weights  and 
volumes,  and  recently  we  have  been  hearing  something  of  the 
masses  and  motions  of  corpuscles  ;  but  on  the  subject  of  atomic 
and  corpuscular  colors,  smells,  and  tastes,  we  appear  to  be 
left  without  information.  What  if  it  should  turn  out  that  these 
minute  things  to  which  science  has  introduced  us  are  not 
colored,  sonorous,  odorous,  sapid  ?  Should  we  not  be  forced  to 
conclude  that,  although  something  is  external  and  can  be 
described  with  more  or  less  accuracy,  yet  the  secondary  quali- 
ties under  discussion  must  be  denied  externality?  This 
sounds  very  Lockian.  Everything  we  directly  perceive  is 
dragged  into  the  mind ;  what  is  outside  has  some  qualities  more 
or  less  resembling  quahties  that  the  things  we  seem  to  per- 
ceive seem  to  have ;  but  certain  other  qualities  of  the  things 
that  we  have  heretofore  regarded  as  external  are  wholly  lack- 
ing in  the  world  of  matter. 

This  position  has  only  a  superficial  plausibility.  It  may  be 
effectually  refuted  by  two  quite  distinct  arguments.  Let  us 
consider  the  first. 

I  beg  the  reader  to  follow  me  in  imagining  the  man  who  is 
inchned  to  degrade  tables,  chairs,  woodcutters,  and  trees    to 


The    World  Withotit  and  tJic   World  Wilhin     143 

the  rank  of  mere  appearance,  and  who  is  disposed  to  exalt 
atoms  and  corpuscles,  to  become  suddenly  endowed  with  a 
sense  or  senses  much  more  acute  than  any  he  now  possesses. 
Suppose  that  he  has  become  directly  aware  of  the  existence  and 
motions  of  atoms,  as  he  was  once  aware  of  the  colored  balls 
thrown  into  the  air  by  the  conjurer.  Perhaps  he  would,  at 
first,  be  inclined  to  flatter  himself  with  the  thought  that  he  now 
perceives  the  external  world  as  it  is,  whereas  he  was  before 
fed  upon  appearances  and  nothing  more.  Nevertheless,  if 
our  figure  has  any  real  meaning,  if  we  are  still  talking  about 
sense  and  about  things,  in  any  intelligible  signification  of  those 
words,  is  it  not  inevitable  that  he  should  begin  to  ask  himself 
the  questions  that  arose  in  his  mind  before  ?  A  given  change 
makes  itself  perceptible  to  him.  Is  this  an  external  change, 
or  is  there  a  change  only  in  his  perceptions  ?  Why  should 
we  assume  that  there  is  no  problem  of  internal  and  external 
to  one  dwelling  in  the  land  of  atoms  ? 

The  questionings  of  a  man  in  this  position  might  be  made 
more  insistent  by  the  discontent  of  a  scientific  companion, 
who  carried  over  to  the  new  life  memories  of  passages  contained 
in  the  books  written  for  and  read  by  ordinary  mortals.  "I 
am  as  sick  of  atoms,"  complains  the  promoted  scientist,  "as 
ever  the  Lady  of  Shalott  was  of  shadows.  Are  we  never  to 
have  a  glimpse  of  things  as  they  really  are  outside  ?  Remem- 
ber what  Lodge  said  of  the  relation  of  a  corpuscle  to  the  atom 
of  which  it  forms  a  part." 

In  the  illustration  referred  to  an  atom  of  hydrogen  is  repre- 
sented by  an  ordinary  church,  and  the  corpuscles  constituting 
it  are  represented  by  about  one  thousand  grains  of  sand, 
darting  in  all  directions,  or  rotating  with  inconceivable  velocity, 
and  filling  the  whole  interior  of  the  church  with  their  motions. 
Our  atom-seer  perceives  nothing  at  all  like  this,  and  he  is  com- 
pelled to  admit  that,  if  atoms  really  are  like  this,  he  does  not 
perceive  atoms  as  they  are.     He  may  conclude  that  what  he 


144  ^-^^    World  We  Live  In 

perceives  is  wholly  "inside,"  and  that  what  is  "outside"  is 
not  the  atom,  but  the  corpuscle. 

Let  the  man  attain  the  third  degree,  and  become  capable 
of  a  direct  inspection  of  corpuscles.  If  we  keep  to  the  analogy 
of  sense  and  perception  at  all  —  if,  that  is,  our  words  have  a 
meaning  —  what  is  to  prevent  the  old  problem  from  breaking 
out  again?  Acuteness  of  sense  has  nothing  to  do  with  the 
matter.  The  distinction  of  inner  and  outer  remains  the  same 
for  all  degrees  of  dullness  and  acuteness.  No  one  claims  that 
all  the  experiences  of  a  myopic  man  are  internal,  and  that  only 
he  who  enjo3^s  good  vision  can  see  external  things.  No  one 
supposes  that  what  I  now  see,  as  I  turn  my  eyes  about,  is  all 
internal,  but  that  what  I  see  when  I  apply  my  eye  to  the 
microscope  is  an  outside  thing.  And  there  is  no  better  rea- 
son for  maintaining  that  the  objects  I  perceive  in  this  room  are 
internal  or  mental,  but  that  such  things  as  atoms  are  not. 

Whether  we  are  deahng  with  the  things  we  perceive  in  our 
everyday  life,  with  the  atom,  with  the  corpuscle,  or  with 
something  beyond,  perhaps,  the  ether,  we  are  confronted  with 
precisely  the  same  question :  In  the  particular  instance  before 
us,  what  may  we  properly  regard  as  physical,  and  what  must 
we  refer  to  ourselves  and  call  mental  ?  Nor  is  there  the  slight- 
est reason  for  assuming  that  we  should  decide  the  matter  in 
one  way  in  the  case  of  tables,  chairs,  trees,  and  woodcutters, 
and  in  another  way  in  the  case  of  such  things  as  atoms  and  cor- 
puscles. If,  then,  we  are  talking  about  a  tree  and  a  wood- 
cutter, let  us  keep  to  the  tree  and  the  woodcutter,  and  not 
wander  off  to  something  else,  which,  we  will  find,  has  troubles 
of  its  own,  which  it  is  proper  to  consider  when  the  thing  in 
question  is  considered.  Here  we  may  keep  to  the  tree  and  the 
man,  and  may  ask  :  How  do  we  distinguish  between  the  things 
and  our  ideas  of  the  things  ?  Can  we  distinguish  between  a 
change  in  the  things  and  a  change  merely  in  our  percepts? 
We  have  seen  that  we  can  do  so,  that  men  generally  do  so,  and 


The   World  Without  and  the   World  Within    145 

that  it  is  possible  to  do  so  without  consulting  either  the  chemist 
or  the  physicist. 

And  now  for  my  second  argument.  We  all  admit  that  atoms 
and  corpuscles  are  not  directly  perceived.  Yet  we  do  not  hesi- 
tate to  attribute  to  them  position  in  space  and  motion  in  space. 
Not  in  some  unknown  and  unknowable  space  with  which  the 
space  of  which  we  are  directly  aware  has  no  intelligible  rela- 
tion ;  but  in  the  very  space  in  which  exist  the  tilings  we  per- 
ceive about  us.  I  hold  my  pen  here  in  my  fingers,  and  I  look 
at  it.  I  believe  that  a  certain  swarm  of  atoms  exists,  and  that 
the  pen  which  I  perceive  guarantees  its  existence.  Where  is 
the  pen  ?  In  a  definite  place  determined  by  its  relations  to 
other  material  things  which  are  also  perceived.  Where  are 
the  atoms  that  I  think  of  as  composing  the  pen?  No  man 
of  science  would  locate  them  on  the  other  side  of  the  moon  or 
in  one  of  the  satellites  of  Jupiter.  No  man  of  science  would 
believe  in  them  if  they  could  not  be  located  at  all.  I  follow 
common  sense  and  science  in  referring  them  to  the  space  oc- 
cupied by  this  pen. 

But,  suppose  I  conclude  that  the  pen  which  I  directly  per- 
ceive is  wholly  inside  me  —  that  it  is  a  mere  mental  representa- 
tive of  something  beyond.  Where  are,  then,  the  atoms?  I 
beg  that  the  lesson  of  the  last  chapter  be  held  clearly  in  mind. 
Unless  something  external  is  perceived  directly,  nothing  at  all 
can  be  known  to  be  external,  and  to  talk  of  its  position  and  mo- 
tion, or  of  the  time  during  which  it  undergoes  its  changes,  is 
simply  absurd.  Atoms  located  in  the  unknown  and  vibrating 
at  no  time  that  can  be  specified  are  not  the  atoms  which,  as 
science  tells  me,  compose  this  pen.  The  only  claim  which  the 
latter  have  to  a  position  in  space  is  based  upon  the  similar 
claim  urged  by  the  pen.  Draw  the  pen  inside,  deny  that  it 
exists  in  space,  and  you  cut  loose  from  its  moorings  and  render 
wholly  insignificant  the  space  occupied  by  the  atoms. 

If,  then,  anything  is  external,  the  very  things  that  I  per- 


146  The   World  We  Live  In 

ceive  about  me  are  external.  Their  qualities  are  physical 
qualities,  not  sensations ;  they  may  properly  be  said  to  belong  to 
things  and  to  have  their  place  in  the  external  world.  There  is 
no  reason  to  discriminate  against  colors,  sounds,  odors,  tastes. 
If  we  apply  to  such  phenomena  the  tests  by  which  we  in  any 
instance  distinguish  between  what  is  in  things  and  what  is  in 
us,  we  find  that  it  is  quite  possible  to  distinguish  between 
objective  and  subjective,  what  should  be  attributed  to  things 
and  what  should  be  attributed  to  some  change  in  the  sense  or 
to  some  change  in  the  relation  of  the  sense  to  the  things  in 
question.  We  may,  then,  without  being  shamefaced  about 
the  matter  or  calling  it  a  concession  to  human  weakness,  say 
frankly  that  the  flower  is  blue  and  has  a  scent.  This  is  just  as 
true  as  it  is  that  the  bud  grows  and  the  flower  unfolds  its  petals. 
The  so-called  secondary  qualities  of  bodies  do  belong  to  the 
bodies,  as  they  seem  to.  The  language  of  common  life  and 
of  science  does  not  need  correction  at  the  hands  of  the  philoso- 
pher. My  chair  there  against  the  wall  has  size  and  shape, 
and  it  has  also  color.  The  size  and  shape  cannot  properly  be 
said  to  be  in  me ;  neither  can  the  color. 

But  what  of  atoms  and  corpuscles  ?  If  they  exist,  they  are 
external,  too.  Not  more  really  external  than  are  the  things 
revealed  by  our  senses,  but  just  as  truly  external,  and  external 
in  the  same  sense.  It  is  the  only  sense  in  which  anything  can 
be  physical  and  external  at  all. 

Have  these  atoms  and  corpuscles  the  qualities  we  have  been 
discussing?  In  attributing  to  them  position  and  motion  in 
space,  we  make  them  not  absolutely  unlike  the  things  we  see, 
feel,  hear,  taste,  and  smell ;  but  may  we  attribute  to  them  the 
other  properties  of  such  things,  and  claim  that  an  increase  in 
the  acuteness  of  the  senses  which  we  actually  possess  might 
reveal  their  presence  ?  To  this  I  answer,  it  will,  perhaps,  be 
time  enough  to  ask  for  a  detailed  description  of  atoms  and 
corpuscles  when  men  know  more  about  them  than  they  seem 


The    World  Without  and  the   World  Within    147 

to  know  at  present.  As  they  are  not  chairs  and  tables,  it  may 
very  well  be  that  they  are  without  some  of  the  qualities  which 
we  perceive  chairs  and  tables  to  have.  This  would,  of  course, 
have  no  bearing  on  the  question  whether  such  qualities  are 
possessed  by  chairs  and  tables.  The  question  of  the  qualities 
to  be  attributed  to  the  minutest  constituents  of  material  things 
is  a  question  for  the  physicist.  He  may  find  good  reason  for 
maintaining  that  an  electron  cannot  be  colored,  just  as  he  has 
found  good  reason  for  holding  that  a  bell  cannot  ring  in  a  world 
without  an  atmosphere. 

It  is  not  for  the  philosopher  to  dogmatize  touching  matters 
which  lie  within  the  realm  of  the  chemist  or  of  the  physicist. 
But  he  is  within  his  right  when  he  points  out  that  the  man  who 
will  talk  intelHgibly  of  anything  must  remain  within  the  sphere 
of  phenomena.     We  do  not  leave  that  sphere  when  we  neglect 
the  consideration  of  colors,   sounds,   odors,   and  tastes,   and 
occupy  ourselves  with  the  geometrical  properties  of  things, 
discourse  of  masses  and  motions.     We  do  not  leave  it  when  we 
pass  from  the  consideration  of  the  things  of  everyday  life  to 
the  consideration  of  atoms,  or  from  the  study  of  atoms  to  that 
of  corpuscles.     Everywhere,  if  our  speech  is  to  remain  signifi- 
cant at  all,  we  must  deal  with  phenomena,  always  with  phe- 
nomena.    And  the  land  from  which  we  set  out  upon  every 
voyage   of   discovery   is   Everybody's   World,    the  world   of 
phenomena  physical  and  mental  with  which  we  are  all  f amihar. 
We  must  be  credulous,  indeed,  if  we  allow  the  hardy  mariners 
who  return  from  visits  to  other  shores,  where  things  are  more  or 
less  different,  to  persuade  us  that  the  trees  which  we  perceive 
to  be  green  are  not  green,  and  that  our  roses  are  not  fragrant. 


CHAPTER  XI 

THE   NEW   EEALISM  AND   EVERYBODY'S   WORLD 

It  is  now  time  for  us  to  see  whether  the  New  Realist  has 
occupied  himself  with  getting  a  clearer  view  of  the  world  in 
which  we  actually  live,  and  to  which  we  all  pay  the  substantial 
tribute  of  involuntary  recognition,  or  has,  after  soaring  on  the 
wings  of  the  poetic  imagination  in  search  of  worlds  wliich  are 
nowhere  in  particular,  returned  to  relate  to  us  his  dreams.  The 
pot  of  gold  unearthed  at  the  foot  of  the  rainbow  must  submit 
to  the  test  of  the  laboratory  before  it  can  be  passed  from  hand 
to  hand  as  an  acceptable  medium  of  exchange.  Is  the  world  of 
the  New  Reahsm  none  other  than  Everybody's  World  mth  its 
dark  places  Hghted  up  ?  Or  is  it  a  strange  country  that  is  offered 
us?  one  whose  milk,  honey,  and  h>pertrophied  agricultural 
products  may  indemnify  us  for  the  loss  of  the  old  home  to 
which  we  are  adjusted  and  which  impresses  us  as  being  real  ? 

Let  us  summarize.  It  is  a  commonplace  of  Everybody's 
World  that  there  exist  external  material  things,  the  qualities 
and  the  relations  of  which  we  can  directly  perceive.  It  is  be- 
lieved that  these  things  are  not  in  our  minds,  and  may  not 
properly  be  called  sensations,  percepts,  or  ideas,  but  exist  con- 
tinuously and  independently  of  us.  The  suggestion  that  we 
create  these  things  in  knowing  them  would  be  scouted  as  ab- 
surd. It  is  recognized  that  they  form  a  system,  and  that,  by 
reference  to  this  system,  individual  things  and  happenings  may 
be  assigned  a  place  and  date. 

Each  of  these  features  of  Everybody's  World  is  accepted 
without  reservation  by  the  New  Realist.  He  does  not  obliter- 
ate them,  he  emphasizes  them.     When  he  finds  the  plain  man 

148 


The  New  Realism  and  Everybody  s   World     149 

and  the  man  of  science  lending  an  ear  to  the  wisdom  of  the 
serpent  and  inchning  to  the  behef  that  the  things  which  ap- 
pear to  belong  to  the  external  world  cannot  really  be  there,  but 
must  be  inside  themselves,  he  furnishes  an  antidote  to  the 
poison  and  brings  them  back  to  common  sense.  This  he  does  in 
making  more  clear  what  they  had  only  half  recognized ;  namely, 
that  "inside"  does  not  mean  "in  the  body,"  and  that  what  we 
perceive  directly  are  not  little  copies  or  images  of  the  external 
things  in  question,  but  are  the  very  things  themselves.  He 
points  out  that  the  supposed  difficulty  that  plagues  them  is  a 
fictitious  one.  An  ancient  misconception  led  men  to  believe 
that  things  throw  off  little  copies  of  themselves,  that  these 
penetrate  to  some  region  of  the  body,  and  that  these  alone  are 
directly  known.  Tliis  is  crude;  this  is  palpably  absurd; 
this  is  contrary  to  experienced  fact.  When  it  is  once  made  clear 
what  may  properly  be  meant  by  "external"  and  "internal," 
we  are  reheved  of  the  modern  shadow  of  this  ancient  incubus, 
and  we  may  come  back  to  the  natural  belief  that  we  are  as 
directly  conscious  of  external  things  as  we  are  of  anything 
whatever.  Moreover,  we  may  with  a  clear  conscience  accept 
as  external  the  things  we  actually  perceive,  with  just  the  quali- 
ties and  relations  which  we  perceive  them  to  have.  We  are 
not  compelled  to  scrape  them  of  their  qualities  before  we  ac- 
cept them ;  nor  must  we,  to  the  detriment  of  the  things  we  per- 
ceive, give  the  preference  to  certain  other  things,  with,  per- 
haps, other  quahties,  which,  whether  they  do  or  do  not  exist, 
certainly  no  one  has  as  yet  perceived  to  exist. 

As  to  the  independent  existence  of  material  things,  the  New 
ReaHst  is  its  stoutest  champion.  He  calls  attention  to  the  fact 
that  no  man  in  his  senses  means,  when  he  asserts  that  physical 
things  are  independent  of  perception,  that  said  physical  things 
are  not  such  physical  things  as  he  has  perceived,  or  that  they 
have  no  connection  with  what  he  has  perceived.  The  only 
question  that  can  interest  him  is:    Must  such  things  as  he 


150  The   World  We  Live  In 

perceives  lapse  into  nothingness  if  unperceived  ?  The  New 
ReaHst  points  out  that  a  doubt  on  the  subject  never  arises  in 
the  mind  of  any  one  save  through  a  misconception.  It  is  not 
natural  to  think  that  tables  and  chairs  are  of  so  feeble  and 
dependent  a  nature  that  they  need  the  support  of  a  bystander 
if  they  are  not  to  vanish  Hke  smoke.  Men  do  not  spontaneously 
arrive  at  such  conclusions.  They  are  not  met  with  in  common 
life;  they  are  nowhere  to  be  found  in  science.  But  once 
suggest  to  a  man  that  tables  and  chairs  are  not  what  he  thought 
them,  but  should  be  called  sensations  or  ideas,  and  they  become 
to  him  wet  tissue-paper.  He  is  ready  to  exclaim  :  ''Whoever 
heard  of  an  independent  shadow  ?  If  my  sensations  and  ideas 
are  not  in  my  mind,  where  are  they  ?  As  well  discuss  an  inde- 
pendent toothache  as  an  independent  table." 

From  this  gratuitous  degradation  and  pauperization  of 
physical  things  the  New  Realist  would  save  the  man  of  native 
good  sense  who  is  in  danger  of  slipping.  Some  things  are 
perceived  to  exist  in  the  physical  world ;  some  are  believed 
to  exist  in  spite  of  the  fact  that  we  do  not  perceive  them. 
They  are  believed  to  exist  on  the  strength  of  evidence,  and  this 
evidence  is  subject  to  the  usual  canons  of  the  inductive  and  de- 
ductive logic. 

Whether  such  unperceived  things  do  or  do  not  exist  can  in 
most  instances  better  be  determined  by  the  man  of  special 
knowledge  than  by  the  philosopher.  One  can  judge  perfectly 
well  of  the  evidence  without  reflecting  upon  the  precise  signifi- 
cance of  the  words  "physical  existence."  Those  who  are  the 
most  occupied  with  the  problem  of  what  does  or  does  not  exist 
in  the  external  world,  and  can  give  us  the  most  information 
worthy  of  attention,  commonly  reflect  Httle  upon  this  ques- 
tion. That  does  not  prevent  them  from  knowing  very  well 
that  it  is  one  thing  to  prove  that  something  exists  or  has  existed, 
and  quite  another  to  prove  that  some  one  perceives  it  or  might 
have  perceived  it. 


The  New  Realism  and  Everybody's   World     151 

All  that  the  pliilosopher  can  do  is  to  make  more  clear  and  ex- 
plicit what  the  words  "independent  physical  existence"  may 
properly  mean.  He  may  point  out  that  he  who  proves  that 
something  exists  in  the  physical  world  is  furnishing  evidence 
that  certain  phenomena  have  their  place  in  the  objective  order 
of  phenomena  with  a  part  of  which  we  have  a  direct  acquaint- 
ance in  perception.  This  added  information  does  not  compel 
the  plain  man  and  the  man  of  science  to  reverse  their  judgments. 
On  the  contrary,  it  makes  it  plain  that  the  distinctions  which 
they  have  drawn  are  entirely  justified,  and  it  ought  to  induce 
them  to  turn  a  deaf  ear  to  those  who  would  mislead  them. 

Thus,  the  New  Realist  accepts  frankly  the  continuously 
existing  independent  physical  things  of  Everybody's  World, 
and  he  defends  them  against  attack.  He  sees  clearly  that  the 
only  space  and  time  in  which  we  ever  try  to  place  and  date 
anything  are  the  space  and  time  borrowed  from  this  physical 
system.  Seeing  this,  he  recognizes  it  as  the  very  backbone 
of  the  orderly  world  in  which  we  live,  and  he  warns  men  off 
from  assaults  upon  it. 

To  return  to  our  summary.  It  is  a  commonly  recognized 
truth  that,  had  we  no  senses,  we  should  not  perceive  anything. 
It  is  well  known  that  things  appear  different  as  revealed  to 
different  senses,  and  as  their  relations  to  a  single  sense  vary. 
We  all  accept  the  fact  that  there  are  sentient  creatures  of  many 
orders,  equipped  with  senses  and  nervous  systems  of  various 
grades.  We  regard  it  as  unquestionable  that  the  world  of 
physical  things  cannot  reveal  itself  to  all  these  creatures  un- 
der the  same  aspect. 

But  neither  the  plain  man  nor  the  man  of  science,  while 
accepting  all  this,  finds  himself  forced  to  conclude  that  the 
world  of  physical  things  is  not  known  at  all.  Each  assumes 
that  it  is  known  and  that  it  can  furnish  him  with  places  and 
dates.  Neither  feels  tempted  to  locate  extinct  reptiles  in  his 
mind,  or  to  date  geological  epochs  by  placing  them  between  two 


152  The   World  We  Live  In 

of  his  ideas.  When  we  ask,  where  are  the  creatures  that  now 
have  an  experience  of  the  world  different  from  our  own  ?  or, 
when  did  other  creatures  have  their  being  ?  answers  are  forth- 
coming which  have  a  significance  for  science.  It  is  taken  for 
granted  on  all  hands  that  these  creatures,  if  they  exist  or  have 
existed,  belong  to  the  same  world.  It  is  accepted  that,  if  they 
may  be  said  to  perceive  at  all,  they  perceive  the  same  world. 

These  positions  constitute  an  implicit  recognition  of  the 
World  as  Phenomenon,  and  they  are  heartily  approved  by  the 
New  ReaUst.  But,  since  he  who  recognizes  the  world  to  be 
phenomenon  only  implicitly,  and  without  a  very  clear 
consciousness  of  what  he  is  doing,  is  in  some  danger  of  falling 
into  perplexities  when  he  begins  to  reflect,  the  New  Realist 
thinks  it  necessary  to  make  the  truth  expKcit  and  to  guard 
against  misconception.  Thus,  he  advises  men  not  to  overlook 
the  fact  that,  when  we  say  that  we  all  perceive  the  same  physi- 
cal things,  we  do  not  mean  and  we  never  have  meant  that  we  all 
have  the  same  experiences.  That  we  perceive  the  same  things 
he  does  not  doubt  for  a  moment.  That  most  men  have  no  very 
clear  notion  of  what  they  have  a  right  to  mean  when  they  use 
the  word  "same"  in  this  connection  seems  to  him  e\ddent,  and 
he  tries  to  enlighten  them. 

I  hope  it  has  been  made  plain  that  the  New  Reahst  has  ac- 
cepted \^^thout  reservation  the  physical  world  of  things  recog- 
nized by  Everybody.  He  has  rubbed  out  no  outhne ;  he  has 
only  thrown  a  Httle  more  light  upon  what  before  lay  in  the 
shade.  The  material  world  issues  from  his  hands  as  stable,  as 
dependable,  as  independent,  as  it  has  always  been  supposed 
to  be  —  a  world  into  which  we  are  born  at  some  definite  time, 
in  which  we  endure  for  a  space,  and  which  we  do  not  carry  with 
us  when  we  depart  out  of  it,  in  spite  of  the  fact  that  it  is  phe- 
nomenon and  is  revealed  under  different  aspects  to  different 
creatures. 

And  now  for  the  New  ReaHst  and  the  mind.     We  have  seen 


The  New  Realism  and  Everybody  s   World     153 

that  minds  are  accepted  without  question  in  Everybody's 
World,  and  that  they  are  invariably,  if  somewhat  vaguely, 
referred  to  bodies.  The  New  Realist  accepts  them  as  une- 
quivocally, and  also  refers  them  to  bodies. 

I  remarked  in  Chapter  I  that  the  subject  of  minds  is  rather 
a  dark  spot  in  Everybody's  World.  Notwithstanding  the 
Cartesian  assurance,  now  on  record  for  centuries,  that  the 
mind  is  more  easily  known  than  the  body,  the  plain  man  has 
persisted  in  feehng  very  uncertain  about  the  nature  of  the 
mind,  and  his  utterances  remain  vague.  That  he  has  a  mind, 
he  never  doubts ;  that  things  mental  are  not  things  material, 
he  doubts  as  little  ;  that  his  mind  is  related  to  his  body  as  it  is 
not  related  to  other  things,  appears  to  him  undeniable.  He 
speaks  of  his  dreams,  of  his  memories,  of  his  sensations,  as  be- 
ing in  his  mind.  Exactly  what  he  means  by  using  the  expres- 
sions which  he  does  use  he  leaves  undetermined. 

Here  the  New  ReaHst  comes  to  his  aid,  and  endeavors  to  make 
clear  to  him  what  he  sees  but  dimly.  He  begins  by  pointing 
out  that,  as  in  the  case  of  external  things,  so  in  the  case  of  minds, 
we  have  to  do  with  phenomena  and  nothing  else.  He  shows  how 
mental  phenomena  are,  in  actual  practice,  distinguished  from 
physical.  He  explains  that,  when  we  speak  of  this  or  that 
phenomenon  as  being  in  the  mind,  we  are  referring  it  to  the 
subjective  order  revealed  in  experience,  and  not  to  the  objec- 
tive. He  justifies  the  reference  of  the  mind  to  the  body  by  in- 
dicating just  the  experiences  in  which  the  connection  is 
revealed,  and  he  maintains  that  the  whole  meaning  of  the  refer- 
ence is  to  be  found  in  such  experiences.  In  all  tliis,  he  affirms, 
and  does  not  deny.  He  only  wishes  to  fix  more  clearly  dis- 
tinctions already  recognized,  and  to  prevent  embarrassing  mis- 
conceptions. 

Nevertheless,  it  may  be  objected,  men  generally  do  talk  as 
though  the  mind  were  in  the  body,  perhaps,  in  the  brain; 
and  the  expressions  they  use  suggest  that  they  conceive  it  to 


154  '^^^^   World  We  Live  In 

be  something  different  from  all  mental  phenomena,  taken  singly 
or  collectively.  If  we  admit  that  they  speak  thus,  may  we  not 
maintain  that  these  two  notions  mark  features  in  Everybody's 
World,  and  that  the  New  ReaHst,  in  rejecting  either  or  both  of 
them,  is  guilty  of  perpetrating  a  robbery  upon  the  pubhc  ? 

Over  the  first  of  these  points  I  need  not  Unger.  I  have  indi- 
cated ^  that  the  modern  man  does  not  put  the  mind  unequivo- 
cally into  the  body.  Even  a  moderate  share  in  the  enlighten- 
ment of  our  day  carries  him  beyond  that.  But  the  second 
point  it  is  worth  while  for  us  to  consider. 

An  ancient  philosophical  tradition  made  the  "substance" 
of  such  things  as  tables  and  chairs  sometliing  quite  distinct 
from  all  the  phenomena  in  wliich  these  objects  present  them- 
selves. I  think  we  must  admit  that  a  more  or  less  faint  echo 
of  this  ancient  tradition  makes  itself  perceptible  in  the  thought 
of  the  average  layman  to-day.  When  men  say  that  a  table  has 
qualities  and  stands  in  relations,  they  do  not  seem  to  be  clearly 
aware  that  it  is  constituted  by  such  phenom.ena,  although  they 
never  look  for  anything  else  in  it.  Shall  we  say,  when  we  take 
into  account  their  attitude,  that  this  "substance"  is  a  feature 
of  the  physical  world  recognized  in  common  life  and  in  science  ? 

It  would  be  absurd  to  say  this.  When,  in  common  life, 
men  describe  the  things  about  them,  they  leave  it  completely 
out  of  their  reckoning.  Who  would  think  it  necessary,  in  de- 
scribing a  bit  of  wood,  a  stone,  a  mass  of  metal,  a  geologic  age 
or  a  stellar  system,  to  refer  to  this  philosophic  fiction  ?  Abso- 
lutely everything  that  we  have  to  say  about  physical  things, 
their  changes,  their  relations,  can  be  said  while  confining 
oneself  to  the  world  of  phenomena.  To  speak,  then,  of  "sub- 
stance," in  this  sense  of  the  word,  as  a  feature  of  the  physical 
world  recognized  by  Everybody,  seems  scarcely  more  sensible 
than  to  maintain  that  the  Unknowable  is  a  feature  of  the 
Carboniferous  System.  The  man  of  science  ignores  this  use- 
less fiction  precisely  as  does  the  plain  man.     In  his  deepest 


The  New  Realism  and  Everybody  s    World     155 

investigations  into  the  constitution  of  matter,  he  never  once 
refers  to  it.  The  world  of  phenomena  is  good  enough  for 
him. 

We  have  a  parallel  to  this  physical  "substance"  in  the  mind 
supposed  to  be  something  different  and  distinct  from  phe- 
nomena and  their  relations.  We  say  that  the  mind  has  sensa- 
tions and  ideas,  we  speak  of  them  as  in  the  mind.  Does  this 
mean  that  something  which  may  not  properly  be  said  to  belong 
to  the  World  as  Phenomenon  should  be  regarded  as  an  ac- 
cepted feature  of  the  world  in  which  we  all  find  ourselves? 
Surely  not. 

We  can  scarcely  call  that  a  feature  which  has  nowhere  been 
sketched  into  the  picture,  and  which  is  not  to  be  seen  at  all  by 
one  who  gazes  upon  it.  The  painter  who  claims  to  have  por- 
trayed St.  Jerome  in  his  cave,  and  who  confronts  us  with  a 
canvas  upon  which  is  portrayed  the  mouth  of  a  cavern  and 
nothing  more,  cannot  persuade  us  to  purchase  by  assuring  us 
that  the  saint,  though  invisible,  really  is  inside  and  must  be 
regarded  as  a  feature  of  the  painting.  When  we  scrutinize  the 
utterances  of  the  plain  man,  when  we  weigh  and  analyze  his 
accounts  of  his  own  mind  and  of  other  minds,  we  find  that 
quite  all  that  he  really  has  to  say  of  the  mind  is  said  about 
the  mind  as  phenomenon. 

He  refers  his  own  mind  to  a  body  existing  at  a  particular 
time  and  place.  He  can  give  some  account,  rather  a  vague 
account,  of  the  mental  phenomena  of  which  he  has  experience. 
He  can,  within  certain  hmits,  furnish  a  description  of  various 
other  minds,  which  he  refers  to  certain  bodies.  But  of  the 
modern  successor  of  the  ancient  "mind  as  substance"  —  of  an 
"activity"  or  "awareness,"  timeless,  spaceless,  indescribably 
colorless  and  unmeaning,  identical  in  all  persons  ^  —  of  this  the 
plain  man  says  nothing  and  knows  nothing.  This  Jerome 
cannot  justly  be  said  to  sit  at  any  time  at  the  door  of  any  cave. 
He  cannot  be  identified  with  any  saint,  or  distinguished  from 


156  The   World  We  Live  In 

any  sinner.  He  is  a  metaphysical  fiction  which  we  have  no 
right  to  substitute  for  a  dark  spot  in  Everybody's  World  and 
to  describe  as  a  feature.  Without  loss  to  anyone,  he  may 
be  dropped  out  of  reckoning.  The  psychologist  finds  him  as 
useless  and  insignificant  as  does  his  less  scientific  neighbor. 
He  is  quite  ready  to  turn  him  over  to  the  philosopher  as  being 
recalcitrant  stuff  of  which  he  can  make  no  use  in  his  science 
—  a  science  which  is,  nevertheless,  supposed  to  give  an  account 
of  minds. 

Mental  phenomena  are  a  feature  of  Everybody's  World. 
So  are  minds,  if  we  mean  minds  as  revealed  in  mental  phe- 
nomena. Such  minds  the  New  Realist  accepts ;  and  he  sub- 
scribes without  reservation  to  the  treatment  actually  accorded 
to  them  in  common  Hfe  and  in  science. 

There  is  one  more  point  upon  which  I  may  reasonably  be 
expected  to  dwell  before  leaving  the  topic  of  the  New  Realism 
and  Everybody's  World.  I  have  said  above  that  we  perceive 
the  qualities  and  relations  of  things  directly ;  that  our  experi- 
ence of  the  physical  is  as  immediate  as  is  that  of  the  mental.  In 
saying  this  I  believe  that  I  am  only  putting  into  words  the 
tacit  assumption  of  common  sense  and  of  science.  It  may  be 
admitted  that  this  is  the  tacit  assumption  of  common  sense 
and  of  science,  and  yet  the  protest  may  be  entered  that  both 
of  these  make  admissions  which  do  not  seem,  at  first  sight,  at 
least,  compatible  with  this  assumption.  Is  it  not  admitted  by 
Everybody  that  our  knowledge  of  things  has  feeble  beginnings, 
that  it  grows,  that  it  may  contain  error,  that  it  should  be  held 
subject  to  possible  correction  ?  How  can  one  maintain  that 
things  are  directly  revealed,  immediately  given  in  experience, 
and  yet  that  we  may  be  in  error  about  them  ?  Can  the  New 
Realist  tread  this  path  in  the  company  of  the  plain  man  ? 

That  there  is  no  real  difficulty  before  us  ought  to  be  evident, 
it  seems  to  me,  to  one  who  has  read  carefully  the  preceding 
chapters.     Nevertheless,  to  make  the  apparent  difficulty  as 


The  New  Realism  and  Everybody  s   World    157 

formidable  as  possible  before  attempting  to  meet  it,  I  shall 
adduce  certain  striking  illustrations. 

From  a  distant  point  of  view  I  watch  the  woodman  swinging 
his  ax;  I  may  maintain  that  I  see  a  man,  clothed  in  a  certain 
fashion,  going  through  certain  motions  a  quarter  of  a  mile 
away.  A  nearer  approach  reveals  the  fact  that  I  was  in  error 
as  to  the  man's  dress  and  as  to  the  distance.  Was,  then,  the 
man  as  I  saw  him  external  ?  or  was  this  an  internal  represen- 
tative of  something  external  ? 

I  see  a  figure  in  a  mirror.  It  appears  to  be  behind  the  mir- 
ror, and  to  have  a  definite  location  at  a  certain  distance  and 
direction  from  my  body.  Is  it  actually  where  it  seems  to  be,  or 
is  it  somewhere  else  ? 

I  hear  a  tram  approaching  from  the  right,  and  spur  my  jaded 
steps  to  intercept  it.  I  discover  that  the  sounds  have  been 
reflected  from  the  house  across  the  way,  and  that  the  tram  is 
going  in  the  wrong  direction.  Did  I  hear  the  sounds  made 
by  the  tram  approaching  from  the  left? 

A  puff  of  smoke  makes  itself  apparent  upon  the  horizon, 
and  some  seconds  later  I  hear  a  booming  sound.  I  do  not  hesi- 
tate to  say  that  I  heard  the  gun  fired.  Yet,  the  sound  I  heard 
was  certainly  heard  later  than  anything  that  I  regard  as  the 
immediate  result  of  the  explosion.  Can  the  one  phenomenon 
be  assigned  two  different  times  of  being  ? 

I  look  into  the  starry  heavens  at  night,  and  the  man  of 
science  informs  me  that  some  of  the  stars  which  I  seem  to  see 
may  have  burned  themselves  out  ages  ago,  and  may  now  be 
emitting  no  light  at  all.  Can  any  one  see  a  flaming  star  that 
does  not  flame  ?  What  does  one  really  see  in  such  an  instance  ? 

In  the  face  of  such  facts  as  these,  what  becomes  of  the 
doctrine  that  what  is  external  is  directly  revealed  in  our  expe- 
rience ?  that  we  perceive  things  as  they  are  and  where  they  are  ? 
The  first  temptation  of  a  man  confronted  with  them  is  to  slip 
into  something  resembling  the  ancient  Empedoclean  doctrine  of 


158  The  World  We  Live  In 

images  or  copies  discussed  in  Chapter  II.  The  plain  man  with 
some  scientific  information  may  say :  What  one  really  sees  is 
the  image  on  the  retina  of  the  eye ;  what  one  really  hears  is  the 
disturbance  in  the  ear  caused  by  the  air- waves.  The  philos- 
opher may  say  :  It  is  an  error  to  believe  that  in  perception  we 
have  actual  experience  of  a  present  object ;  our  experiences 
themselves  are  in  a  place  represented  by  the  brain  events  with 
which  they  are  correlated.^  He  may  even  go  so  far  as  to  say : 
They  are  the  brain  events,  considered  in  themselves  :  the  object 
is  somewhere  else.* 

I  shall  be  compelled  in  the  next  chapter  to  come  back  to  the 
philosophical  doctrine  just  alluded  to.  Here  I  need  only  say 
that  the  New  Realist  must  seek  some  other  way  out  of  his  ap- 
parent difficulties.  He  who  puts  everything  immediately  ex- 
perienced "inside"  is  doomed,  whether  ancient  Greek  or 
modern  European,  to  lose  his  external  world  altogether. 

Nor  is  the  New  Realist  reduced  to  this  forlorn  expedient.  In 
the  distinction,  dwelt  upon  in  Chapters  IX  and  X,  between 
internal  and  external,  it  was  in  no  way  implied  that  external 
things,  to  be  known  at  all,  must  be  known  exhaustively  and  ac- 
curately, nor  that  all  that  is  external  is  known  immediately, 
even  when  known.  It  was,  indeed,  shown  that  we  have  as  im- 
mediate an  experience  of  physical  phenomena  as  we  have  of 
mental.  But  he  who  will  turn  to  the  illustrations  there  brought 
forward,  and  will  consider  their  significance,  may  discover  that 
there  is  nothing  in  the  distinction  to  suggest  that  we  may  be 
absolved  from  the  duty  of  finding  out  with  pains  and  effort 
what  the  qualities  and  relations  of  physical  things  are. 

I  sit  here  at  my  table  and  cast  my  eyes  about  my  room. 
My  hand  and  pen,  the  table,  the  chair  opposite  me,  the  lounge 
beside  it,  the  wall  behind  them,  stand  out  as  external  things 
which  I  perceive.  The  ticking  of  the  clock  on  my  table  I  also 
recognize  as  external,  and  I  refer  it  to  the  clock.  Were  I 
innocent  of  all  past  experiences,  did  these  experiences  break  in 


The  New  Realism  and  Everybody's   World    159 

upon  me  for  the  first  time,  they  would  not  be  freighted  with 
the  meaning  which  they  actually  carry  now.  I  should  not 
know  that  I  can  lay  my  hand  on  the  table,  walk  over  to  the 
chair,  chase  the  dog  off  of  the  lounge,  stop  the  clock.  What 
seems  to  me  now  the  revelation  of  the  moment  is  something  to 
which  I  have  attained. 

Nevertheless,  it  is  not  well  to  misconceive  either  that  with 
which  I  started  or  that  to  which  I  have  attained.  Had  I  not 
had  the  fundamental  distinction  between  physical  phenomena 
and  mental  phenomena  to  build  upon,  I  should  never  have  found 
myself  where  I  am.  I  now  perceive  table,  chair,  and  lounge 
opposite  my  body.  My  clock  ticks  in  front  of  me.  Where  do 
I  perceive  the  chair  to  be  ?  How  far  is  it  from  my  body,  and 
how  far  from  the  table  and  the  lounge  ?  Where  do  I  hear  the 
clock  ticking  ?  These  are  significant  questions.  Any  answer 
that  I  am  in  a  position  to  give  must  be,  to  be  sure,  somewhat 
inaccurate.  I  may  misjudge  to  some  degree  the  distances  of 
the  things  in  question  from  each  other  and  from  my  body ; 
I  may  be  inaccurate  in  describing  directions.  But,  on  the 
whole,  my  errors  here  are  relatively  small.  The  objects,  their 
qualities,  their  positions  and  relations,  stand  out  in  my  expe- 
rience, and  such  as  they  form  a  basis  for  judging  of  what  is  less 
definitely  and  directly  revealed. 

Let  me  take  an  illustration.  I  stand  gazing  upon  the  rising 
moon.  The  question  may  be  raised :  Do  I  perceive  the 
moon  where  it  is  and  as  it  is  ?  It  is  clear  that,  in  calling  this 
that  is  before  me  the  rising  moon,  I  do  not  conceive  myself 
to  be  concerned  with  an  isolated  phenomenon.  This  phenome- 
non taken  alone  is  not  what  any  one  means  by  the  moon.  It  is 
a  revelation  of  the  moon  under  given  circumstances.  By 
having  recourse  to  other  experiences  of  things  external,  by  lis- 
tening to  the  voice  of  science,  I  may  learn  that,  were  the  relation 
of  my  body  to  any  part  of  the  moon  what  it  is  to  this  table  or 
to  that  chair,  the  moon  would  be  revealed  under  a  very  differ- 


i6o  The   World  We  Live  In 

ent  aspect  and  one  which  much  better  explains  the  part 
which  the  moon  actually  plays  in  the  system  of  nature.  For 
this  reason  I  give  it  the  preference  in  describing  the  moon.  It 
is  a  similar  reason  that  induces  me  to  accept  the  astronomer's 
account  of  the  place  of  the  moon  in  preference  to  the  indefinite 
suggestions  of  distance  which  the  experience  carries  with  it 
even  to  the  unlearned.* 

It  should  be  observed  that  we  are  concerned  with  physical 
phenomena  from  the  outset.  But  it  should  never  be  for- 
gotten :  (i)  that  a  single  experience  of  the  external  does  not  by 
itself  constitute  what  men  call  a  thing;  (2)  that  some  such 
experiences  give  very  inadequate  inform.ation  about  things; 
and  (3)  that  some  are  actually  misleading  to  men  at  a  certain 
stage  of  the  development  of  their  experience  of  the  world. 

Shall  I,  then,  say  I  see  the  moon  as  it  is  and  where  it  is? 
Yes,  if  the  person  to  whom  I  am  speaking  can  be  counted  on  to 
exercise  ordinary  common  sense  in  interpreting  my  statement. 
I  see  the  moon  to  be  round,  or  approximately  so,  and  I  see  it 
out  there  in  front  of  my  body.  One  thing  is  as  certain  as  any- 
thing can  be  :  What  I  immediately  perceive  is  not  on  the  retina 
of  my  eye  or  in  my  brain.  I  perceive  it  to  be  in  front  of  my 
body,  and,  if  I  insist  on  drawing  it  into  my  brain,  my  body 
must  be  drawn  in  with  it,  which  results  in  incoherence. 

All  this  is  simply  taken  for  granted  in  ordinary  speech. 
Men  ask  where  the  m.oon  is.  What  they  want  to  know  is  its 
distance  and  direction  from  other  material  things.  It  never 
occurs  to  them  that  the  moon  as  seen  from  a  distance  is  in  one 
place  and  the  moon  as  seen  near  at  hand  must  be  in  another. 
Which  means  that  they  are  not  inquiring  about  the  place  to  be 
assigned  to  different  percepts  of  the  moon.  And  when  they 
ask  what  the  moon  is  like,  they  are  not  desirous  of  knowing  how 
it  would  look  from  all  conceivable  distances  and  under  all  con- 
ceivable circumstances.     He  who  is  concerned  to  know  about  a 

*  See  Chapter  XII,  on  the  topic  of  Appearance  and  Reah'ty. 


The  New  Realism  and  Everybody  s   World    i6i 

thing  and  its  relation  to  other  things  seeks  certain  definite 
information  regarding  the  phenomena  which  constitute  the 
external  order.  He  must  have  immediate  experience  of  the 
external  somewhere  and  to  some  extent,  or  he  would  have  no 
foundation  on  which  to  build.  But,  given  such  a  foundation, 
he  may  attain  to  a  very  accurate  and  extensive  knowledge  of 
things ;  and,  if  he  is  sensible,  he  will  not,  in  giving  an  account 
of  things  and  their  quahties,  wander  off  into  the  domain  of  the 
psychologist  and  begin  talking  about  percepts. 

And  now  let  me  return  briefly  to  the  supposed  difficulties 
instanced  a  few  pages  back.  May  the  New  Reahst  maintain 
that  he  perceives  immediately  the  distant  woodman  and  the 
figure  in  the  mirror,  that  he  hears  the  approaching  tram  and  the 
thundering  cannon,  that  he  sees  the  star  wliich  no  longer 
shines  ? 

He  sees  the  man  at  a  distance,  and  he  attempts  a  description. 
The  experience  which  he  has  does  belong  to  the  external  order ; 
it  is  an  experience  of  a  thing.  It  should  be  remarked,  how- 
ever, that  he  is  not  in  the  least  concerned  to  describe  the  expe- 
rience. Thai  he  leaves  to  the  psychologist.  What  he  tries  to 
describe  is  the  thing.  He  has  observed  that  some  experiences 
give  fuller  and  more  accurate  information  about  things  than  do 
others.  In  telling  us  what  he  sees,  he  tries  to  give  us  such  in- 
formation about  the  thing.  His  data  are  inadequate,  and  he 
makes  some  errors.  It  is  contrary  to  common  usage  and 
contrary  to  good  sense  to  say  that  he  does  not  see  the  distant 
man.  He  sees  him  imperfectly,  as  he  should,  under  the  cir- 
cumstances. But  he  sees  him  in  front  of  his  body,  and  in  the 
same  space  with  his  body  as  he  can  perceive  it.  He  does 
not  see  him  on  the  retina  of  his  eye  or  in  his  brain. 

Here  we  have  a  quite  normal  ordering  of  experiences  after  a 
fashion  which  we  are  called  upon  to  exercise  at  every  hour  of 
the  day.  The  man  at  a  distance  is  at  once  seen  to  be  at  a  dis- 
tance and  in  a  certain  direction  —  that  is,  the  experience  at 

M 


1 62  The   World  We  Live  In 

once  brings  its  own  interpretation  in  other  experiences.  Such 
suggested  interpretations  are  so  easily  verified  and  are  so  con- 
stantly being  verified  in  our  experience  of  things  that  we  have 
little  consciousness  of  the  distinction  between  the  experience 
and  its  interpretation. 

The  other  cases  are  slightly  different,  in  that  there  is  what 
may  be  called  an  illusion.  Where  do  I  see  the  figure  in  the 
mirror  to  be  ?  Where  do  I  hear  the  tram  ?  Do  I  hear  the  gun 
when  it  is  fired  ?     Do  I  see  the  extinct  sun  ? 

The  difliculty  of  giving  direct  answers  to  such  questions  lies 
in  the  fact  that  language  is  not  adjusted  to  what  present 
themselves  in  the  experience  of  men  generally  as  exceptional 
phenomena.  No  well-informed  person  is  deceived  as  to  the 
facts  themselves.  In  each  of  the  above  instances  we  have  to  do 
with  an  immediate  experience  of  phenomena  of  the  objective 
order,  with  a  revelation  of  some  aspect  of  the  external  world. 
In  each  instance  the  experience  carries  with  it  the  suggestion 
of  an  interpretation.  My  first  impulse  is  to  interpret  the  ex- 
perience according  to  the  common  rule,  which  I  follow,  and 
have  reason  to  approve,  every  day.  A  wider  knowledge  of  the 
external  world,  a  knowledge  which  is  the  outcome  of  many 
experiences,  reveals  that  I  must  not  apply  my  rule  indiscrim- 
inately. I  learn  to  say :  I  see,  in  the  mirror  before  me,  the 
image  of  a  man  standing  behind  me ;  I  hear  the  sound  of  an 
approaching  tram  reflected  from  a  wall ;  I  shall  hear  that  gun 
fired  when  the  sound-waves  reach  my  ear ;  I  see  a  point  of 
light,  and  I  know  that  there  was  a  flaming  star  out  there, 
whether  it  is  flaming  now  or  not. 

Were  men  sufficiently  well  informed,  and  were  such  expe- 
riences as  those  alluded  to  sufficiently  common,  there  would 
in  no  case  be  the  shadow  of  an  illusion.  Each  experience  of  the 
external  world  would  be  given  its  proper  significance  auto- 
matically, and  there  would  be  no  impulse  to  misconceive 
it.     Language  would  adjust  itself  to  palpable  fact,  and  the  ex- 


The  New  Realism  and  Everybody  s   World     163 

pressions  used  in  referring  to  such  experiences  would  not 
sound  paradoxical. 

There  is,  thus,  no  reason  why  the  New  Reahst  should  not 
maintain,  with  the  plain  man  and  with  the  man  of  science,  that 
we  have  immediate  experience  of  external  things  and  of  their 
relations.  He  need  make  no  other  reservations  than  those 
which  he  finds  tacitly  accepted  in  common  Kfe  and  in  science. 
It  is  there  tacitly  accepted  that  the  physical  is  immediately 
given  in  experience,  and  it  is  not  doubted  that  our  knowledge 
of  things  has  small  beginnings,  must  increase  gradually,  and 
should  be  held  subject  to  possible  correction. 

The  New  Realist  is,  as  we  see,  one  who  recognizes  old  truths 
and  approves  well-tried  distinctions.  Whether  we  consider 
physical  things  or  turn  our  attention  to  minds,  we  do  not  find 
him  wandering  at  random  in  the  void  and  exercising  his  free 
creative  activity  in  a  manner  more  creditable  to  the  liveliness 
of  his  imagination  than  to  the  sobriety  of  his  judgment.  His 
journeyings  have  brought  him  back  to  Everybody's  World  — 
to  the  real  things  and  to  the  real  minds  of  our  common  expe- 
rience. He  has  not  returned  to  deny  the  world,  to  destroy  the 
world,  or  to  sublimate  the  world  into  something  quite  different 
from  what  it  has  heretofore  been  believed  to  be.  He  has  come 
back  with  the  conviction  that  common  sense,  although  it  is 
somewhat  inarticulate,  and  often  feels  truths  blindly  rather 
than  sees  them  clearly,  is,  on  the  whole,  surprisingly  sensible. 

He  has  learned,  and  that  is  no  small  thing,  that  the  philos- 
opher is  not  a  magician,  and  cannot  create  for  us  a  new  heaven 
and  a  new  earth.  His  business  is  not  transformation.  The  wise 
thing  for  him  to  do  is  to  accept  a  world  of  which  much  was 
known  before  ever  he  entered  it,  and  to  walk  about  in  it  soberly, 
Hghting  up,  as  well  as  he  can  with  his  httle  lantern,  what  seem 
to  be  the  obscure  places  in  it. 

A  sober  business,  to  be  sure ;  but  then,  life  is  a  sober  busi- 
ness, or  should  be.     If  the  New  Realist  is  right,  we  have  to  do 


164  The   World  We  Live  In 

with  a  world  which  we  already  know  pretty  well,  and  to  which 
we  are,  perforce,  more  or  less  adjusted.  Our  task  seems  to  be 
to  see  somewhat  more  clearly  and  in  better  perspective  what 
we  have  already  seen  imperfectly,  and  to  make  our  adjust- 
ment a  more  reasoned  one. 

Berkeley  offered  us  a  new  world  in  place  of  the  old.  It 
turned  out  to  be  not  a  world  at  all.  It  was  a  rosy  vision  that 
faded  even  as  we  gazed.  By  a  new  insight,  a  bit  of  argument 
as  yet  unthought  of,  though  it  lay  on  the  threshold  of  many  a 
mind  before  him,  he  would  transform  the  world.  He  did  not 
transform  it ;  he  lost  it,  although  he  never  discovered  his  loss. 

His  experience  may  well  suggest  to  us  the  necessity  of  so- 
briety and  caution.  The  consciousness  that  the  world  of  the 
philosopher  is,  after  all,  only  the  world  in  which  we  have 
always  lived,  should  serve  as  a  wholesome  check  upon  extrava- 
gant expectations.  Who  looks  for  the  Mountain  of  Gold  or  the 
Valley  of  Diamonds  in  the  suburbs  of  Boston,  or  on  the  banks 
of  the  Hudson?  We  have  a  right  to  approach  with  caution 
arguments  which  seem  to  compel  us  to  distinctly  new  and  start- 
Hng  views  of  a  system  of  things  with  which  we  have  long  had 
some  acquaintance.  We  do  well  to  distrust  dazzHng  revela- 
tions. 

And,  if  we  lose  some  thrills  in  keeping  our  feet  upon  the  soil 
of  Everybody's  World,  we  find  ourselves  not  without  compen- 
sations. We  at  least  have  a  world.  We  are  set  free  from  that 
distrust  of  minds  and  things  as  revealed  in  appearances  which 
has  cast  its  shadow  over  some  men  of  sufficiently  acute  intel- 
lect. We  are  relieved  of  the  burden  of  a  hopeless  search  for  a 
Reality  wholly  different  in  nature  from  the  homely  realities 
with  which  we  are  brought  face  to  face  every  day. 

Naturally,  as  temperaments  differ  and  not  all  men  have  the 
same  education,  there  may  be  expected  differences  of  opinion 
as  to  what  should  or  should  not  be  regarded  as  starthng  reve- 
lations and  approached  with  a  certain  distrust.     Some  accept 


The  New  Realism  mid  Everybody  s   World     165 

easily  momentous  conclusions  which  strike  others  as  resting 
upon  the  slenderest  of  foundations  and  unsupported  by  real  evi- 
dence. Those  who  have  Kved  long  in  the  atmosphere  of  a  given 
philosophic  tradition  may  see  Everybody's  World  through  its 
mists,  and  may  be  quite  unaware  that  the  sunsets  to  which  they 
are  accustomed  are  anything  to  be  surprised  at. 

I  shall,  therefore,  in  indicating  what  doctrines  should  be 
approached  with  caution  and  even  with  tentative  suspicion,  be 
compelled  to  speak  from  the  point  of  view  of  some  philosopher. 
I  take  the  New  Realist,  who  is  at  no  small  pains  to  do  justice 
to  Everybody's  World.  He  objects  to  its  demolition ;  he 
does  not  want  it  metamorphosed.  He  has  learned  that  one 
may  burn  one's  fingers  at  the  lamp  held  aloft  by  the  philoso- 
pher, and  that  its  precious  little  flame  sometimes  smokes 
abominably,  giving  off  clouds  of  words  that  thicken  the  air 
and  interfere  with  clear  vision. 

Having  indicated  my  standpoint,  I  may,  without  further 
ado,  maintain  that  it  is  our  duty  to  listen  in  a  very  critical  spirit 
to  the  prophet  who  would  transfigure  the  system  of  things, 
given  in  our  common  experience,  by  asserting  that  the  World 
is  Mind-stuff,  that  it  is  Will,  that  it  is  Idea  or  Reason  or  God. 
Especially  should  we  be  on  our  guard  against  those  who,  in- 
stead of  pointing  out  to  us  how  we  may  best  adjust  ourselves 
to  the  World,  seem  incUned  to  teach  us  that  we  may  assume  the 
World  to  be  Our  Creature  and  may  compel  it  to  adjust  itself 

to  us. 

It  should  be  understood  that  I  have  no  wish  to  impugn 
either  the  genius  or  the  learning  of  those  who  bring  us  such  reve- 
lations. The  plain  man  passes  them  by,  and  is  little  affected 
by  them.  The  reflective  may  be  tempted  to  accept  them  as 
a  foundation,  and  to  build  upon  them.  A  presumptive  right 
to  acceptance  such  revelations  may  not  claim.  Their  right 
must  be  established  by  a  careful  weighing  of  evidence,  and 
before  a  court  where  logical  laws  rule  supreme. 


1 66  The   World  We  Live  In 

In  certain  chapters  to  follow  I  shall  discuss  —  of  necessity, 
very  briefly  —  the  views  indicated  above.  I  think  it  will 
appear  that  what  is,  in  each  case,  offered  us,  is  not  a  clearer 
view  of  the  world  revealed  to  common  knowledge  and  made  the 
object  of  science.  It  is  a  substitute  for  it.  The  New  Realist 
admits  that  Everybody's  World  must  have  its  face  washed, 
if  its  features  are  to  stand  out  unmistakably.  But  when  he 
discovers  that  the  more  he  washes  a  given  face,  the  more  it 
becomes  apparent  that  its  possessor  cannot  be  the  person  he 
thought  he  had  in  his  hands,  he  grows  increasingly  suspicious. 
For  this,  one  can  scarcely  blame  him. 


CHAPTER  XII 

THE   WORLD   AS   MIND-STUFF  AND   THE   WORLD  AS   WILL 

As  I  sit  here  writing,  I  raise  my  eyes  to  view  the  material 
things  that  present  themselves  before  me.  My  table,  the  chair 
opposite,  the  lounge  beside  it,  the  pictures  which  hang  upon  the 
v/all  above  them,  stand  revealed  with  some  distinctness.  Do  I 
really  perceive  them  in  front  of  my  body  and  in  relation  to  it 
and  to  each  other  ?  As  we  have  seen,  the  answer  of  common 
sense  and  of  science  is  unequivocally  in  the  affirmative. 

Do  I  perceive  them  as  they  really  are?  The  question  must 
not  be  brushed  aside  as  a  foolish  one.  We  have  touched  upon 
it  a  few  pages  back,  but  it  merits  a  more  detailed  discussion, 
for  certain  answers  which  have  been  given  to  it  loom  up  as  ob- 
stacles which  threaten  to  jolt  our  orderly  world  from  the  orbit 
in  which  it  has  heretofore  rejoiced  to  run  its  course,  and  to 
make  of  it  a  wandering  star  in  the  chaotic  realm  of  mere 
appearance. 

Admitting  that  I  perceive  the  physical  things,  of  which  I  have 
just  spoken,  precisely  as  I  should  perceive  them  under  the 
circumstances,  that  is,  sitting  here  with  my  eyes  open,  and 
with  the  room  lighted  as  it  is  —  admitting  this,  may  it  not 
be  questioned  whether  the  circumstances  are  wholly  favorable, 
and  whether,  if  I  seriously  wish  to  describe  the  things  referred 
to,  I  should  not  appeal  from  these  experiences  to  something 
else  ?  Did  I  walk  over  to  that  chair,  I  might  discover  defects 
in  it  which  are  hidden  from  me  here.  Did  I  bring  my  face  close 
to  the  picture  above  it,  I  might  see  details  which  now  escape  me. 

Men  are  constantly  appealing  from  things  revealed  under 
certain  circumstances  to  the  same  things  revealed  under  certain 

167 


1 68  The   World  We  Live  In 

others.  This  does  not  mean  that  they  are  turning  their  backs 
upon  things  as  phenomena,  and  phenomena  of  the  objective 
order.  It  means  that  they  are  gi\'ing  to  certain  phenomena 
the  preference  over  certain  others,  and  are  accepting  them  as  a 
more  adequate  revelation  of  the  things.  It  is  in  accordance 
with  common  usage  of  speech  to  say  that,  under  given  circum- 
stances, things  appear  so  and  so,  but,  perceiving  them  more  sat- 
isfactorily, we  find  that  they  really  are  so  and  so. 

Thus,  we  say  that  the  staff  which  looks  bent  in  the  water 
really  is  as  straight  as  it  feels  to  the  hand ;  that  the  edge  of  the 
plank  which  we  are  planing  seems  straight  to  the  finger,  but 
may  be  seen  to  be  really  crooked,  when  we  look  along  it  as  the 
carpenter  does.  In  the  endeavor  to  secure  full  and  accurate 
information  about  things,  we  may  appeal  from  one  sense  to 
another,  from  given  experiences  of  the  one  sense  to  other 
experiences  of  the  same,  or  we  may  have  recourse  to  reason- 
ings, and  may  go  beyond  what  can  be  directly  revealed  to  any 
sense.  How  far  it  is  wise  to  go,  in  a  particular  instance,  is 
matter  of  convenience  or  of  convention ;  how  far  one  can  go 
can  only  be  determined  by  the  limitations  of  human  knowl- 
edge. I  may  appeal  from  sight  to  touch,  from  touch  to 
sight,  from  either  of  these  to  smell  or  taste ;  I  may  appeal 
from  a  distant  view  of  a  thing  to  a  closer  view,  may  reject 
that  for  the  revelations  of  the  microscope,  or  may  betake  my- 
self to  atoms  or  corpuscles. 

Such  a  distinction  as  this  between  appearance  and  reality  need 
not  throw  me  into  consternation  or  revolutionize  for  me  the 
material  world  in  a  corner  of  which  I  find  myself.  This  path- 
way to  reality  is  marked  by  homely  distinctions  famihar  to  aU 
and  not  likely  to  be  misunderstood.  If  I  remark  to  my  serv- 
ant, when  he  enters  the  room  to  stir  the  fire,  that  I  could  see 
the  chair  or  the  picture  better  by  shifting  my  position,  he  would 
not  be  surprised  at  the  familiar  fact ;  he  would  only  marvel 
at  my  thinking  it  worth  while  to  point  it  out. 


The   World  as  Mind-stuff  169 

My  friend  walks  into  the  room  and  sits  down  on  the  chair 
to  begin  a  chat.  Like  everytliing  else  in  the  room,  his  body 
may  be  revealed  to  me  under  various  aspects,  and  I  may  dis- 
tinguish between  appearance  and  reahty  here  as  elsewhere. 
I  may  ask  him  to  sit  close  to  me,  that  I  may  see  him  better. 
Possibly  it  may  cross  my  mind  that  he  could  be  scrutinized 
piecemeal  through  a  microscope.  If  I  have  been  reading  in 
the  works  of  the  chemists  and  the  physicists,  I  may  reflect 
that  his  pleasant  smile  betrays  the  presence  of  swarms  of  atoms 
or  the  ceaseless  whirl  and  clash  of  corpuscles. 

To  be  sure,  if  I  want  to  Hsten  to  my  friend's  discourse  and  to 
enjoy  his  presence,  it  is  not  wise  for  me  to  allow  my  mind 
to  dwell  too  much  upon  his  reahty  conceived  in  chemical  or 
physical  terms.  Neither  chemist  nor  physicist  could  take  joy 
in  the  companionship  of  his  spouse,  whatever  her  charms  in 
the  eyes  of  the  vulgar,  did  his  mind  refuse  to  dwell  upon  the 
appearance  presented,  but  hurry  on  to  the  contemplation  of  the 
reahty  as  it  is  revealed  to  speculation  in  the  pitiless  light  of 
science.  The  man  of  science  very  sensibly  concludes  that  the 
appearance,  too,  is  real,  and  reveals  something  unmistakably 
present  in  a  real  world  of  which  he  has  experience.  He  reserves 
his  atomic  and  corpuscular  meditations  for  the  laboratory  and 
the  lecture  room. 

Suppose,  however,  that  I  take  my  friend  in  another  spirit, 
and  use  him  as  the  starting-point  for  philosophical  reflection. 
His  body  is,  then,  to  me  a  material  thing  revealed  now  under 
this  aspect,  now  under  that.  It  is  a  thing  which  has  its  place 
in  a  material  world,  at  a  measurable  distance  from  my  body, 
from  the  lounge,  from  the  door.  Whether  I  see  any  of  these 
things  far  or  near,  view  them  with  the  naked  eye  or  subject 
them  to  microscopic  investigation,  content  myself  with  them 
as  they  can  be  made  to  appear,  or,  with  the  eye  of  scientific 
faith,  contemplate  them  as  atoms  or  corpuscles,  I  am  concerned 
with  what  is  material  and  belongs  to  the  same  space  with  my 


lyo  The   World  We  Live  In 

body.  Where  the  appearance  is,  there  is  the  reahty  —  that  is, 
they  are  both  phenomena  of  the  external  order,  and,  within 
certain  limits,  we  may  have  direct  experience  of  the  substitu- 
tion of  the  one  for  the  other. 

The  kernel  of  the  physical  nut  is  physical,  and  physical  sci- 
ence never  expects  it  to  be  anything  else.  After  the  atoms, 
the  corpuscles;  after  the  corpuscles,  perhaps  the  ether; 
after  the  ether,  what  ?  certainly  not  a  wave  of  emotion,  or  the 
stuff  that  can  be  worked  up  into  a  dream.  The  pathway  to 
reality  breaks  off  with  unnatural  sharpness,  if  it  be  conceived 
to  end  in  such.  A  road  that  for  a  while  leads  somewhere,  and 
then  suddenly  takes  a  turn  that  is  no  turn,  and  leads  in  no  di- 
rection and  to  no  place,  may  not  properly  be  called  a  road. 

But  my  friend  has  a  mind  as  well  as  a  body.  I  do  not  have 
to  be  a  philosopher  to  know  this.  In  some  sense,  I  refer  his 
mind  to  his  body.  The  crude  physical  reference  of  the  ancient 
world,  I  have  outgrown.  I  do  not  believe  that  the  most  ex- 
haustive scientific  investigation  could  reveal  my  friend's  mind 
to  be  in  his  body  as  is  a  gland  or  the  secretion  of  a  gland. 
Nevertheless,  I  accept  my  friend's  mind  as  unhesitatingly  as  I 
accept  his  body;  I  recognize  that  it  belongs  to  the  world  I 
know.  In  this  I  am  at  one  with  common  sense  and  with 
science.  I  say,  and  say  truly,  that  his  mind  is  revealed  by  his 
words  and  actions.     It  stands  as  their  interpretation. 

Now,  in  accepting  the  physical  objects  about  my  body  as 
sometimes  less  and  sometimes  more  satisfactorily  revealed  in 
perception,  and  as  things  regarding  the  intimate  physical  con- 
stitution of  which  science  can  give  me  information,  I  am  on  the 
plane  of  the  common  understanding,  and  am  looking  at  things 
just  as  my  neighbors  do.  In  recognizing  that  my  friend's  mind 
is  not  directly  revealed  to  any  sense,  as  are  this  table  and 
that  chair,  I  am  acknowledging  the  most  commonplace  of  com- 
monplace truths.  All  this  information  I  can  have  and  can 
act  upon  without  having  read  the  philosophers  at  all,  and  with- 


The    World  as  Mind-stuff  171 

out  ever  having  heard  of  the  external  and  the  internal  orders 
of  phenomena.  But  when  I  begin  to  make  sharp  distinctions, 
where  I  was  before  content  with  vague  ones ;  when  I  begin  to 
ask  myself  definitely  how  I  am  to  conceive  the  relations  of  minds 
and  bodies ;  I  show  plainly  that  I  am  not  content  with  Every- 
body's World  as  it  stands  revealed  to  Everybody,  and  it 
becomes  evident  that  I  should  like  to  be  a  philosopher. 

Suppose  that  to  one  in  this  temper  of  mind  that  lucid  genius, 
Wilham  Kingdon  Clifford,  who  may  stand  as  the  prototype 
of  the  modern  panpsychist,  offers  himself  as  a  guide.  He 
makes  certain  distinctions  very  clear,  and  proposes,  on  the  basis 
of  these  distinctions,  a  new  theory  of  the  world-system.  He 
points  out  that  in  perceiving  the  table,  the  chair,  the  lounge, 
my  friend's  body,  I  am  concerned  with  what  may  properly 
be  called  "objects,"  with  something  open  to  direct  inspec- 
tion. He  emphasizes  the  fact  that  my  friend's  mind  can  never 
be  "object"  to  me  in  this  sense,  that  it  must  ever  remain  a  thing 
inferred,  not  immediately  revealed.  He  marks  the  difference 
by  calhng  it  an  "eject,"  a  something  existing,  to  be  sure, 
but  excluded  from  the  class  of  things  which  may  be  presented 
in  my  experience.  It  is,  in  no  opprobrious  sense  of  the  word, 
an  "outcast,"  and  belongs  to  a  class  of  its  own.  Under  no 
circumstances  can  it  take  its  place  among  "objects,"  and  no 
scrutiny  of  "objects"  can  reveal  it  in  the  world  of  things  spread 
out  before  the  senses,  the  things  which  I  recognize  as  material. 

So  much  for  "object"  and  "eject,"  not  merely  accepted 
as  we  all  accept  them,  but  reflected  upon  and  sharply  dis- 
tinguished.    How  are  we  to  conceive  them  as  related  ? 

Influenced  by  a  seventeenth  century  philosopher  charac- 
terized, I  think,  rather  by  the  fertiHty  and  splendor  of  his 
speculative  imagination  than  by  a  taste  for  cautious  and  con- 
sistent reasonings,^  Clifford  attributed  to  all  material  things, 
if  not  mind,  at  least,  something  like  mind,  Mind-stuff,  a  some- 
thing to  be  treated  as  the  mind  of  my  friend  is  treated,  always 


172  The   World  We  Live  In 

an  "eject,"  an  outcast  from  the  world  of  "objects"  and  be- 
longing to  a  world  of  its  own.  How  bring  the  two  worlds 
together?  How  connect  "objects"  with  "ejects"?  Again 
influenced  by  the  same  philosopher,  CHfford  tried  a  coup-de- 
main  :  he  maintained  that  it  is  not  necessary  to  bring  the  two 
worlds  together,  for  they  are  together,  inasmuch  as  they  are 
the  same  thing.  The  "object"  is  the  thing  as  it  appears ;  the 
"eject"  is  the  thing  as  it  is  in  itself ;  the  one  is  the  appearance, 
the  other  is  the  reaHty. 

And  both,  says  Clifford,  are  the  same  kind  of  stuff,  mental 
stuff ;  so  that  the  whole  world  is  to  be  conceived  as  a  world  of 
mind,  or  of  something  Uke  mind.  The  table,  the  chair,  the 
lounge,  the  body  of  my  friend,  are  pictures  in  my  mind.  The 
real  things  outside  of  them  which  correspond  to  them  are  also 
mental,  although  they  can  never  be  in  my  mind, 

CHfford  has  led  us  back  again  into  the  World  as  Idea ;  of 
that  there  can  be  no  doubt,  though  most  idealists  would  scarcely 
regard  him  as  a  proper  guide  to  one  seeking  orientation  in  that 
world.  The  question  that  confronts  us  is :  Can  this  World 
as  Idea  be  accepted  as  the  real  world  of  which,  as  we  are  all 
convinced,  we  have  some  revelation,  and  which  we  desire  to 
see  more  clearly  ? 

Never  !  Clifford  does  not  throw  a  light  upon  Everybody's 
World.  He  casts  over  it  a  spell  under  which  it  is  rolled  up  as  a 
scroll.  I  shall  not  here  criticize  all  his  positions.^  I  shall  not 
demand  evidence  that  mind,  or  something  like  mind,  may  be 
attributed  to  all  material  things.  As  for  his  use  of  the  word 
"reality,"  I  shall  only  remark  that  there  is  absolutely  no 
justification  for  it  in  common  usage  of  speech,  and  that  science, 
when  it  seriously  attempts  to  find  out  what  material  things 
really  are,  and  works  in  a  field  in  which  there  is  some  hope  of 
obtaining  a  definite  answer,  never  dreams  of  ending  a  physical 
investigation  with  the  discovery  of  something  mental.  It  is 
reserved  to  the  philosopher  to  say  that  mind  is  the  reality  of 


The   World  as  Mind-siuff 


I 


-> 


/  j 


matter,  and  the  statement  is  neither  more  nor  less  irresponsible 
than  are  various  other  things  that  some  philosophers  have 
sometimes  seen  fit  to  say. 

Clifford  was  not  merely  a  panpsychist ;  he  was  also  a  man, 
and  an  acute  scientific  man.  In  his  capacity  as  such,  he  said 
many  things  which  have  little  to  do  with  the  revolutionary  doc- 
trine set  forth  above,  and  some  things  that  are  incompatible 
with  it.  But,  as  I  am  concerned  here  only  with  the  doctrine 
of  the  World  as  Mind-stuff,  I  shall  neglect  his  other  utterances, 
and,  indeed,  shall  confine  myself  to  asking :  Is  the  doctrine  in 
question,  I  will  not  say  a  reasonable,  but  even  a  conceivable, 
doctrine  ?  When  Clifford  transforms  for  us  Everybody's  World, 
as  he  does,  making  the  material  things  in  it  our  perceptions,  and 
the  reahty  of  those  material  things  other  minds,  does  he  present 
us  with  anything  that  may  properly  be  called  a  world  at  all  ? 

"What  I  perceive  as  your  brain,"  says  Clifford,  "is  really  in 
itself  your  consciousness,  is  You ;  but  then  what  I  call  your 
brain,  the  material  fact,  is  merely  m.y  perception."  Where  is 
that  perception  ?  Clifford  puts  it,  with  all  other  mental  facts, 
into  the  brain ;  or,  to  be  more  accurate,  he  regards  all  such 
facts  as  parallel  to  som.e  nervous  disturbances  in  the  brain; 
they  are  the  "reality"  of  such  nervous  disturbances. 

Thus,  this  hand  with  which  I  write,  the  table  upon  which  my 
paper  is  lying,  that  chair  and  lounge,  the  body  of  my  friend,  all 
of  them  material  facts  and  all  revealed  to  sense,  must  not  be 
supposed  to  be  where  they  seem  to  be.  In  the  words  of  the 
acute  and  scholarly  panpsychist  quoted  in  the  last  chapter,  it 
is  a  fallacy  to  suppose  that  perception  "involves  actual  experi- 
ence of  a  present  object."  ^  "  Our  perceptive  experiences  are 
not  in  the  order  which  they  reveal,  or  rather  not  in  the  part  or 
place  of  that  order  which  they  reveal,  but  in  a  place  represented 
by  the  brain-events  with  which  they  are  (as  we  say)  correlated. 
The  experiences,  in  other  words,  are  the  brain-events,  con- 
sidered in  themselves."  '^ 


174  The   World  We  Live  In 

This  we  must  regard,  I  think,  as  literally  revolution.  It  is 
the  destruction  of  Everybody's  World.  I  had  heretofore  sup- 
posed that  I  perceived  my  hand  to  be  lying  on  the  table,  the 
table  to  be  in  front  of  my  body,  the  chair  and  the  lounge  to  be 
opposite  and  at  an  assignable  distance.  My  mind  I  referred 
somewhat  vaguely  to  this  body,  a  part  of  which  I  immediately 
perceive.  My  friend's  mind  I  referred  to  his  body,  over  there 
opposite  my  body.  Directions,  distances,  magnitudes,  seemed 
revealed  in  experience ;  the  places  and  times  of  things  seemed 
determinable  and  open  to  inspection.  Even  my  brain,  a  thing 
I  never  hoped  to  perceive  immediately,  I  could  locate  with 
some  definiteness.  I  referred  it  to  this  body,  a  part  of  which 
appears  in  my  experience.  I  supposed  it  to  be  about  fourteen 
inches  away  from  this  hand  of  which  I  am  conscious,  and  in 
an  ascertainable  direction  from  it. 

All  this,  if  I  listen  to  the  panpsychist,  I  must  repudiate. 
The  table,  chair,  lounge,  the  body  of  my  friend,  and  my  own 
body,  as  they  present  themselves  in  my  experience  —  this 
whole  complex  of  phenomena  which  constitutes  the  world  as  I 
immediately  perceive  it,  and  which  must  serve  as  the  sole 
foundation  of  all  my  judgments  as  to  the  distances  and  direc- 
tions of  the  other  things  which  I  believe  in  but  do  not  now  per- 
ceive —  this,  the  world  of  my  experience,  must  be  drawn  into 
my  brain,  and  conceived  to  be  the  "reaHty"  of  some  part  of 
my  brain. 

"My  brain,"  did  I  say  ?  But  to  what  brain  can  I  be  refer- 
ring ?  Surely  not  to  the  brain  which  belongs  to  this  body  which 
I  immediately  perceive,  to  the  brain  which  is  located  in  the 
same  space  with  this  table  and  that  chair,  and  is  at  a  measur- 
able distance  from  them  in  a  given  direction.  All  these  things 
have  been  declared  to  be  "perceptive  experiences,"  seemingly 
without,  but  really,  in  themselves  considered,  "brain-events." 
The  brain  which  I  attribute  to  this  body  whose  hand  I  now 
perceive  to  be  writing,  must  be  just  as  much  a  "brain-event" 


The   World  as  Minds hiff  175 

as  they,  and  its  place  must  be  a  "seeming"  place,  as  is  theirs. 
If  I  accept  such  conclusions,  it  is  unavoidable  that  I  should 
ask  myself  with  anxiety:  Where  is  any  real  thing?  With 
reference  to  what  may  its  position  be  located  ? 

It  is  vain  to  talk  of  "projecting"  my  experiences  without, 
and  thus  getting  the  position  of  the  real  thing.  I  beg  the  reader 
to  remember  how  I  am,  by  hypothesis,  situated.  All  places, 
distances,  directions,  with  which  I  am  immediately  acquainted 
are  "seeming"  places,  distances,  directions,  and  are  "within." 
The  "real"  distances  and  directions  which  I  seek,  and  which 
must  serve  the  purposes  of  my  "projections,"  are  not  the  dis- 
tances and  directions  revealed  in  my  experience.  In  the 
latter  there  is  no  hint  of  the  former.  To  "project"  something 
known  from  an  unknown  place  in  an  unknown  direction,  to 
another  unknown  place,  is  not  the  proper  way  to  find  out  where 
anything  really  is.  It  is  not  a  question  of  continuing  upon  a 
road  upon  which  we  find  our  feet.  The  road  breaks  short  off, 
and  its  supposed  continuation  Hes  in  another  world. 

It  must  have  become  evident  to  the  reader  that  this  panpsy- 
chist  doctrine  is  nothing  else  than  a  new  edition  of  the  very  old 
doctrine  that  we  can  have  an  immediate  knowledge  only  of 
ideas,  and  that  any  realities  corresponding  to  them  must  be 
known,  if  known  at  all,  mediately  and  through  the  ideas.  That, 
in  this  case,  the  realities  are  called  mind  or  mind-stuff  is 
a  detail.  Here,  as  before,  we  have  on  our  hands  a  world  of 
things  immediately  perceived,  which  is  wholly  mental,  and  a 
world  of  things  which  cannot  be  immediately  perceived,  and 
whose  times  and  places  can  mean  nothing  to  us. 

From  this  revolutionary  doctrine  let  us  come  back  for  a  little 
to  the  question  of  mind  and  brain  as  it  is  actually  treated  in 
science.  We  must  not  forget  that  both  common  sense  and 
science,  while  accepting  as  external  and  physical  this  hand  I 
see,  this  table,  that  chair,  the  body  of  my  friend  as  revealed  to 
observation,  do  not  ignore  mental  facts.     Common  sense  refers 


176  The   World  We  Live  In 

them  vaguely  to  the  body.  The  science  which  occupies  itself 
especially  with  them  refers  them  to  certain  hypothetical 
brain-events,  which  it  regards  as  their  correlates.  The  objec- 
tion which  I  bring  against  the  mind-stuff  theory  is  not  in  the 
least  that  it  accepts  brains  and  brain-events  and  talks  of  a 
correlation  of  the  mental  and  the  physical.^  My  objection  is 
that  it  takes  physical  facts,  the  only  physical  facts  revealed  in 
experience,  for  mental  facts,  denies  that  physical  things  are 
where  they  are  immediately  revealed  as  being,  and  makes  our 
real  experienced  world,  with  its  definite  and  ascertainable  places 
and  times  for  tilings  and  occurrences,  a  sham  and  shadow  world 
whose  tilings  and  occurrences  cannot  be  assigned  any  intelh- 
gible  place  and  time  of  being. "^ 

Science  refers  my  friend's  mind  to  my  friend's  brain,  and  my 
mind  to  my  brain.  It  tells  me  that  the  fall  of  a  shutter  in  the 
instrument  on  the  laboratory  table  was  perceived  by  me  at  an 
appreciable  interval  after  the  shutter  fell,  and  when  certain 
occurrences  took  place  in  my  brain.  But  its  "where's"  and 
its  "when's"  are  not  the  dubious  "where's"  and  "when's"  of 
a  "reality"  not  open  to  inspection.  Where  the  falling  shutter 
is,  I  can  accurately  determine.  I  can  measure  its  distance  from 
my  body,  from  the  floor,  from  the  walls.  When  it  fell,  I 
can,  with  the  aid  of  modern  instruments,  determine  with 
a  high  degree  of  accuracy.  This  "when"  means  the  time 
of  the  fall  as  determined  by  a  reference  to  other  changes  in  the 
physical  tilings  which  compose  this  world  to  which  the  shutter 
belongs  —  the  hands  of  the  clock,  the  revolution  of  the  earth 
on  its  axis,  the  journey  of  the  earth  about  the  sun. 

The  place  and  time  of  the  fall  of  the  shutter  can,  I  say,  be 
determined  with  a  good  deal  of  nicety.  But  how  about  the 
place  and  time  of  the  brain-events  supposed  to  be  concerned 
in  my  perception  of  the  fall  ?  Where  my  brain  is  I  can  know 
less  definitely  than  I  can  know  where  the  shutter  is,  for  I  cannot 
get  at  my  brain  in  the  same  direct  way  —  it  is  a  shutter  in  a 


The   World  as  Mind-stuff  177 

closed  box,  regarding  which  I  make  inferences  after  the  anal- 
ogy of  other  such  shutters  whose  boxes  have  been  opened. 
Just  where  in  my  brain  those  particular  brain-events  are  that  I 
should  be  wilhng  to  regard  as  the  correlates  of  mental  events, 
I  do  not  know,  nor  does  any  other  man.  Their  nature  I  can- 
not, with  all  the  aid  given  me  by  the  most  advanced  cerebral 
physiology,  even  venture  to  guess.  The  time  of  these  impor- 
tant occurrences  cannot  be  determined  with  anything  like  the 
precision  with  which  I  can  determine  the  fall  of  the  shutter.  I 
am  groping  and  guessing  as  men  do  not  have  to  grope  and  guess 
in  much  of  their  work  in  certain  of  the  physical  sciences.  And 
in  all  my  groping  and  guessing,  in  my  attempt  to  locate  the 
brain-events  and  to  fix  the  time  of  their  occurrence,  I  have 
absolutely  no  foundation  on  which  to  stand  except  the  places 
and  times  revealed  to  me  in  my  immediate  experience  of  the 
things  I  perceive  about  my  body  and  in  the  order  of  their 
changes. 

Shall  I,  at  the  suggestion  of  the  panpsychist,  gather  up  all 
these  immediate  experiences,  which  constitute  my  only  foun- 
dation for  determining  the  place  or  time  of  anything,  and  shall 
I  relegate  them  to  the  unknown  place  of  unknown  brain-events, 
occurring  at  an  unknown  time  ?  God  forbid  !  Even  a  good- 
natured  man  must  refuse  compliance  with  such  a  request. 
The  Httle  sage  of  Konigsberg  was  certainly  stumbling  along 
the  right  path  when  he  bumped  over  the  rocks  of  his  "  Refu- 
tation" *  and  pushed  forward  even  when  driven  to  desperate 
leaps  from  note  to  note,  and  from  footnote  to  footnote.  If  I 
have  no  immediate  experience  of  the  external  and  physical 
anywhere,  but  am  shut  up  to  presentations  or  ideas ;  if  all  that 
I  can  immediately  know  is  "inside,"  then  I  not  only  lose  what 
is  "outside"  altogether,  but  I  lose  any  "inside"  that  can 
properly  be  said  to  be  anywhere  at  any  time.  Whether  eight- 
eenth-century bishop  or  twentieth-century  physiologist,  I  face 

*  See  Chapter  VI. 
N 


178  The   World  We  Live  In 

the  same  catastrophe.  I  become  a  nobody,  with  no  place  in 
history,  and  no  home  in  an  orderly  world.  My  space  and  time 
have  been  brought  to  nought,  and  as  many  as  might  have  been 
in  them  have  been  scattered. 

The  World  as  Mind-stuff  is,  thus,  no  world.  Nor  can  any- 
thing better  be  said  for  the  World  as  Will.  The  difficulty 
is  identical,  and  the  criticism  must  be  the  same. 

The  psychologist  of  our  time  lays  much  more  stress,  in  liis 
account  of  minds,  on  the  phenomena  of  feeing,  impulse,  will, 
than  did  the  psychologist  of  an  earher  day.  For  this,  I  have 
not  the  faintest  desire  to  quarrel  with  him.  Whether  the 
development  of  a  given  mind  can  best  be  described  from  the 
point  of  view  of  a  realization  of  impulses,  or  may  better  be 
treated  in  another  way,  is  the  affair  of  the  psychologist,  who, 
of  course,  should  exercise  the  same  caution  in  investigation, 
and  the  same  tempera teness  of  speech,  that  we  look  for  in  other 
investigators  of  nature. 

But  we  have  a  right  to  insist  that  the  word  "will"  should 
not  be  taken  as  a  word  to  juggle  with,  any  more  than  the 
words  "sensation,"  "perception,"  "mind"  and  "mind-stuff." 

Thus,  suppose  that  I  begin,  as  all  the  world  begins,  by  accept- 
ing a  system  of  things  in  space  and  time ;  by  acknowledging  a 
number  of  minds  referred  to  these  things,  or  to  some  of  them ; 
by  discovering  among  the  phenomena  which  constitute  these 
minds  sometliing  that  I  call  "will"  in  its  higher  or  in  its 
lower  manifestations."  Suppose  that  I  maintain  that  the  act 
of  will  consists  of  certain  feelings ;  ^  that  there  are  no  feeUngs 
and  no  voUtional  impulses  that  are  not  bound  up  with  what  is 
presented  in  space  and  time.^  Suppose  that  I  insist  that  by  will 
we  must  really  mean  will,  and  that,  in  contemplating  the  ap- 
parent evidences  of  purpose  revealed  in  the  organic  world,  vre 
must  not  attribute  the  attainment  of  ends  there  discerned 
either  to  powers  outside  of  the  creatures  under  consideration 
or  to  unconscious  impulse,  but  must  have  recourse  to  what  in- 


The  World  as  Mimi-shiff  179 

trospection  reveals  as  accounting  for  the  attainment  of  ends  in 
our  own  experience,  to  actual  volition,  which  is  a  complex  of 
sensations  and  feelings. ^° 

Suppose,  I  say,  that  I  make  of  will  a  something  thus  revealed 
in  experience  as  connected  with  the  body,  and  that  I  dis- 
tinguish between  my  \vill  and  other  wills  in  that  I  refer  this 
will  to  tliis  body  and  that  will  to  that.  Suppose  that,  in  order 
to  make  clear  to  myself  what  it  may  mean  for  one  will  to  act 
upon  or  to  stand  in  relations  to  another,  I  fall  back  upon  the 
illustrations  of  the  family,  the  tribe,  the  nation,  the  race.'^ 

May  I,  after  doing  all  this  and  securing  an  orderly  world  in 
which  \\dlls  stand  in  intelhgible  relations  to  each  other  in  that 
wills  are  referred  to  bodies  which  have  their  place  in  a  physical 
system,  give  the  he  to  all  that  I  have  done  before  and  inconti- 
nently declare  that  only  will  is  ultimate,  that  the  whole  orderly 
world  which  I  perceive  is  "presentation,"  a  mere  product  of  the 
multipHcity  of  wills,  and  in  no  sense  independent  ?  ^^  May 
I  abandon  the  concrete  will  heretofore  accepted  as  revealed  in 
experience  and  substitute  for  it  a  ''pure  activity  of  the  will," 
freed  from  all  determinate  content,  beyond  the  realm  of  the 
psychologist,  indescribable  and  unmeaning  ?  '^  ]\Iay  I  say 
that  physical  objects  as  they  are  revealed  to  me  are  only  my 
"presentations,"  that  they  are  really  as  completely  unknown 
to  me  as  the  transcendental  will  referred  to  above,  but  that 
they  must  in  themselves  be  inferred  to  be  other  such  wills  act- 
ing upon  iTiine  ?  ^* 

Let  one  try  to  conceive  the  family,  the  tribe,  the  nation,  the 
race,  as  consisting  of  a  multipHcity  of  transcendental  somethings, 
not  in  space  and  time,  given  in  no  experience,  not  standing  in 
any  describable  relations  to  each  other,  not  falhng  within  the 
realm  either  of  the  psychologist  or  of  the  student  of  physical 
nature,  acting  {sic)  upon  each  other,  and  begetting  {sic)  a  world 
of  appearance,  the  only  world  vouchsafed  to  us,  but  to  which 
they  do  not  themselves  belong  !     It  is  little  wonder  that  the 


i8o  The   World  We  Live  In 

eminent  man  of  science  who  has  earned  our  gratitude  by  lead- 
ing us  through  the  perplexing  mazes  of  the  world  of  psy- 
chological fact,  and  by  insisting  that  we  must  there  walk  cau- 
tiously in  the  light  of  observation  and  experiment,  should, 
in  launching  us  upon  this  unknown  sea,  where  no  coast  can  be 
said  to  be  at  any  distance  or  in  any  direction,  where  the  com- 
pass is  useless,  and  where  the  altitude  of  no  star  can  be  taken, 
feel  it  his  duty  to  tell  us  that  we  are  not  in  the  region  of  evi- 
dence, and  that  we  must  abstain  from  the  attempt  to  prove  a 
reality  corresponding  to  our  ideas.^^ 

From  such  transcendental  heights  it  is  wholesome  to  descend 
to  the  lower  levels  of  common  sense  and  of  science.  He  who 
loses  the  world,  the  real  experienced  world  of  physical  things 
and  mmds,  loses  with  it  his  own  soul.  Certainly  he  has  no  right 
to  call  his  soul  his  own  —  to  recognize  it  as  this  particular  mind 
connected  with  this  particular  body,  to  distinguish  it  from  the 
mind  of  any  one  else.  "Transcendental  apperception"  is  not 
a  soul  that  can  either  be  saved  or  damned ;  ^^  nothing  that 
means  anything  can  happen  to  it  an^^vhere  at  any  time ;  joy 
and  grief,  good  and  evil,  pass  over  its  head,  or  would,  if  it  had  a 
head,  but  being  only  an  "idea  of  the  reason"  to  which  no  real- 
ity can  be  proved  to  correspond, ^^  it  can  only  by  a  stretch  of 
courtesy  be  allowed  a  place  even  in  a  metaphor.  A  derehct, 
drifting  aimlessly,  lo  !  these  many  years,  on  the  hospitable 
currents  of  the  history  of  philosophy,  formless  and  useless, 
something  of  a  menace  to  navigation,  it  is  of  interest  only  as  a 
warning.  We  see  what  the  incautious  mariner  may  make  of  the 
noble  ship  that  once  sailed  from  port  with  crew  and  cargo,  all 
its  sails  spread  for  the  haven  where  it  would  be,  and  busied  with 
the  wholesome  commerce  that  occupies  the  world  of  living  men.^^ 

All  of  which  signifies  that  he  who  really  withdraws  his  foot 
from  the  soil  of  Everybody's  World,  and  trusts  himself  to  aerial 
navigation  in  the  company  of  the  ghosts  of  dead  philosophers, 
must  not  be  surprised  at  passing  through  the  tails  of  nonexist- 


The   World  as  Mind-stuff  i8i 

ent  comets  and  arriving  at  worids  which  are  nowhere.  The  risks 
he  takes  are  the  penalty  of  his  daring ;  and  the  reward  he  reaps 
is  the  passage  from  the  world  of  humdrum  fact  into  the  region 
of  romance,  where  one  is  not  under  the  tiresome  necessity  of 
being  consistent,  and  where  questions  of  proof  and  disproof 
no  longer  spread  one's  bed  with  thorns. 

So  much  for  the  World  as  Mind-stuff  and  the  World  as  Will 
considered  from  the  point  of  view  of  theory.  But  men  are  not 
interested  only  in  theory.  They  find  themselves  in  a  world, 
and  they  seek  to  adjust  themselves  to  it.  It  is  to  them  of  no 
small  moment  under  what  aspect  the  world  seems  to  reveal 
itself.  One  may  be  inclined  to  regard  it  as  a  dreary  desert; 
another  may  accept  it  as  a  cozy  home.  If  we  tell  men  that  the 
whole  world  consists  of  mind  or  mind-stuff,  or  if  we  say  that  the 
only  ultimate  reality  is  a  community  of  wills,  do  we  not  seem  to 
transfigure  the  world  ?  do  we  not  make  dry  bones  live,  in  a  way 
stimulating  to  the  emotions  and  satisfying  to  the  heart? 
Difficulties  connected  with  the  "when,"  the  "where,"  the 
"what,"  of  things,  many  who  hear  such  comforting  words  will 
be  inclined  to  brush  aside.  Why  scrutinize  the  premises  and 
their  connection,  if  the  conclusion  be  so  palatable  !  Perhaps 
it  embodies  truth;  and  is  not  a  welcome  "perhaps"  better 
than  an  unwelcome  "  therefore  "  ? 

To  those  whose  emotional  leanings  may  urge  them  forward 
in  this  direction,  I  recommend  an  unbiased  examination  of  the 
conclusion  itself.  Does  it  really  carry  with  it  even  a  shadow 
of  the  inspiration  which  breathes  in  Berkeley's  doctrine? 
Does  it  make  of  the  world  more  of  a  home  for  the  human  soul, 
or  instill  into  man  any  hopes  which  he  did  not  have  before  ? 

Clifford,  were  he  here  now,  would  attribute  a  mind  to  my 
friend,  and  might  even  love  him.  To  the  table  and  to  the 
chair  he  would  attribute  mind-stuff,  a  something  far  different ; 
nor  would  he  expect  me  to  feel  a  whit  the  less  lonely  on  the 
departure  of  my  friend,  if  I  consented  to  accept  his  panpsychic 


1 82  The   World  We  Live  In 

doctrine,  and  to  hold  that,  after  that  departure,  the  mind-stuff 
of  the  furniture  still  remained.  Neither  of  the  clear  thinkers 
referred  to  earlier  in  this  paper  can  be  accused  of  supposing 
that  his  doctrine  is  in  the  remotest  degree  analogous  to  theism 
in  any  of  the  historical  forms  which  it  has  taken.  A  powdered 
and  distributed  god,  made  up  for  the  most  part  of  disconnected 
"infra-experiences,"  and  conscious  and  intelhgent  only  in  a  few 
Umited  spots,  is  not  what  men  have  called  God.  If  we  accept 
such,  we  do  not  flood  with  golden  Hght  a  world  otherwise  to 
be  described  as  gray  and  cheerless.  We  may  not  talk  of  a  "  far 
off,  divine  event."  We  only  rub  out  altogether  what  science 
even  now  treats  as  a  wavering  and  indefinite  line ;  and  we 
attribute  something  very  faintly  resembling  a  rudimentary 
sentience  even  to  the  elements  which  rage  in  the  flaming  sun 
and  to  the  cosmic  dust  that  drifts  cold  in  the  interplanetary 
spaces.  We  extend  downwards  the  borders  of  hfe  —  a  Hfe 
which  we  already  recognize  as  present  in  the  water  doled  out 
to  the  prisoner  in  his  cell,  and  present  in  abundance  in  the 
ooze  left  by  the  retreating  tide.     We  look  down,  not  up. 

And  if  the  great  German  scholar  last  criticized  stirs  our  emo- 
tions by  speaking  of  a  World-will, ^^  let  us  bear  in  mind  that  this 
is  but  a  name  for  the  community  of  transcendental  wills  dis- 
cussed, above — wills  which  have  no  place  in  any  world  we  know 
and  are  not  wills  at  all  as  such  are  revealed  in  our  experience. 

What  shall  we  name  the  World  as  Mind-stuff  and  the  World 
as  Will  ?  Neither  has  body  enough  to  pass  as  a  reahsm,  for, 
in  each  case,  the  things  revealed  in  space  and  time  have  been 
drawn  within  the  mind;  they  have  become  apparitions.  Yet, 
neither  is  precisely  an  ideahsm,  for  it  seems  to  lack  the  soul. 
I  recognize  their  ambiguous  nature  in  assigning  to  them  a  place 
of  their  own  between  the  two  doctrines  just  mentioned. 


CHAPTER  XIII 

A  WORLD   OF   THE   NEW   IDEALISM 

And  now  for  idealism  —  not  the  idealism  of  Berkeley,  which 
I  have  already  discussed,  but  the  ideahsm  of  our  own  day. 
.  We  have  seen  that  all  realists  are  not  ahke.  To  those  who 
discriminate,  it  is  quite  as  evident  that  all  idealists  are  not  ahke. 
There  are  the  prudent,  the  cautious,  the  guarded,  those  whom 
Kant  would  not,  I  think,  have  regarded  as  "genuine"  or 
"proper"  idealists;  and  there  are  the  bold  and  truculent,  the 
speculative  and  soaring,  whom  Kant  would  have  recognized  as 
unequivocally  ' '  extravagant. ' ' 

It  is  my  aim  here  to  contrast  ideahsm  with  realism.  I  must 
not,  then,  choose  types  of  the  former  which  have  so  lost  the 
historic  features  of  their  order  that  their  representatives,  in 
meeting  a  modern  realist,  are  in  doubt  whether  to  call  him 
friend  or  foe.  I  must  cast  about  me  for  one  or  two  "terrible 
examples."  In  bringing  them  forward  as  such  there  can  be 
nothing  invidious ;  it  can  only  mean  that  the  writers  referred 
to  have  the  honor  of  being  prominent  representatives  of  the 
class  to  which  they  have  elected  to  belong. 

Manifestly,  it  would  be  an  injustice  to  confound  with  such 
writers  those  who  renounce  them  and  all  their  works,  and  have 
in  common  with  them  httle  save  a  generic  name.  In  so  far  as 
the  New  Realist  and  the  New  Ideahst  are  separated  only  by  a 
word,*  they  may  rejoice  together  in  the  sweet  odor  of  their 
common  doctrine,  and  may  walk  hand  in  hand  on  the  sohd 
ground  of  Everybody's  World.  To  such  ideahsts  any  criti- 
cisms contained  in  this  chapter  and  in  the  next  do  not  apply, 

*  See  Chapter  IV,  at  the  end. 
183 


184  The   World  We  Live  In 

and  they  are  under  no  obligation  to  appropriate  them.  But 
there  undoubtedly  are  t>'pes  of  idealism  which  differ  widety 
from  any  form  of  reaUsm  touched  upon  in  this  book.  They 
do  not  accept  Everybody's  World;  they  "transmute"  it. 
It  is  well  to  get  a  good  look  at  these,  and  to  see  what  they  have 
to  offer  in  exchange  for  the  world  which  they  take  from  us. 

Let  us  suppose  an  American,  wearied  with  the  intellectual 
and  spiritual  unrest  to  which  his  own  enterprising  land  is  no 
stranger,  to  seek  a  quiet  retreat  at  Oxford.  He  finds  himself, 
to  all  appearance,  in  green  pastures  and  beside  still  waters. 
The  New  IdeaHsm  receives  liim  into  its  grateful  shade.  The 
Mentor  who  extends  to  him  a  friendly  hand  promises  him  a 
speedy  rehef  from  two  old  burdens  that  have  long  galled  his 
shoulders.  He  is  at  once  mformed  that  our  orthodox  theology 
on  the  one  side  and  our  commonplace  materiahsm  on  the  other 
will  vanish  hke  ghosts  before  the  dayhght  of  free  skeptical 
inquiry ;  the  mutilation  of  his  nature,  which  has  arisen  from 
taking  these  seriously,  will  be  healed ;  he  will  be  rescued  from 
stupid  fanaticism  and  from  dishonest  sopMstry.^ 

Nor  is  his  gain  to  be  merely  negative.  He  wall  be  led  beyond 
the  region  of  ordinary  facts,  brought  into  conmiunion  with 
what  is  beyond  the  visible  world,  may  hope  to  find  some  tiling 
higher,  which  will  both  support  and  humble,  both  chasten 
and  transport  him.  He  is  encouraged  to  beheve  that  he  will 
find  in  metaphysics  a  principal  way  of  experiencing  the  Deity.^ 

Alluring  vistas  are,  thus,  opened  up,  and  high  hopes  are 
inspired.  There  seems  already  faintly  revealed  a  world  less 
opaque  and  disappointing  than  the  one  which  our  neophyte 
has  been  compelled  to  traverse.  His  world  has  been  full  of 
ordinary  facts ;  it  is  the  commonplace  visible  world  which 
men  generally  inhabit  —  a  world  of  seemingly  undeniable 
material  things  and  of  minds  more  or  less  like  his  own.  It  has 
proved  itself  a  world  not  wholly  without  light  and  color,  but 
one  stretching  away  into  a  darkness  where  all  colors    and 


A    World  of  the  New  Idealisin  185 

contours  are  lost.  Into  that  darkness  even  the  imagination  of 
man  ventures  timidly  and  with  hesitating  steps.  And  it  has 
been  a  world  of  strife ;  our  traditional  theology,  our  common- 
place materiahsm,  and  many  combatants  not  precisely  resem- 
bling the  one  or  the  other,  have  filled  it  with  the  shout  of  battle 
and  the  clangor  of  arms.  But  such  as  he  has  found  it,  it 
has  been  a  world  impossible  to  ignore.  There  it  has  been,  there 
it  is,  there  it  will  remain.  No  vision  which  visits  him  can 
make  him  wholly  forget  that  he  feels  it  beneath  his  feet. 

The  method  adopted  to  still  the  strident  voice  of  that  soul- 
less phantom,  our  commonplace  materialism,  seems  to  be  an 
attack  upon  this  world. ^  It  is  pointed  out  as  at  once  evident 
that,  "there  is  no  being  or  fact  outside  of  what  is  commonly 
called  psychical  existence.  FeeUng,  thought,  and  volition 
(any  groups  under  which  we  class  psychical  phenomena)  are 
all  the  material  of  existence,  and  there  is  no  other  material, 
actual  or  even  possible."  •* 

Now,  one  thing  has  seemed  certain  even  to  one  stunned  by 
the  noise  of  the  fray,  and  bewildered  by  the  cries  of  the  com- 
batants. The  world  of  material  things,  the  field  on  which  the 
battle  is  fought,  must  be  accepted,  whatever  else  be  doubted. 
But,  on  the  basis  of  this  doctrine  that  everything  is  psychic, 
what  becomes  of  the  material  world  —  what  becomes,  for 
example,  of  such  a  thing  as  a  mountain  ?  Does  the  mountain 
exist  only  for  the  individual,  and  while  he  perceives  it  ?  Shall 
it  be  allowed  no  sort  of  independence  ? 

To  this  protest  of  the  flesh  an  answer  is  forthcoming  which 
seems,  on  the  surface,  reassuring :  "The  physical  world  exists, 
of  course,  independent  of  me,  and  does  not  depend  on  the 
accident  of  my  sensations.  A  mountain  is^  whether  I  happen 
to  perceive  it  or  not."  ^ 

But  what  follows  is  again  disquieting.  Our  inquirer  is 
informed  that,  when  he  is  not  perceiving  the  mountain  in 
question,  it  may,  for  all  he  knows  to  the  contrary,  be  perceived 


1 86  The   World  We  Live  In 

by  some  other  finite  creature ;  or,  if  not  perceived  at  all,  it 
may,  at  least,  be  thought  about.  Has  not  that  which  is 
thought  about  some  kind  of  existence  ?  Hence,  the  mountain 
exists,  in  some  fashion,  for  some  mind  or  something  like  a  mind.^ 
Is  not  that  enough  ? 

Some  such  account  of  the  mountain  was  given  long  ago  by 
Bishop  Berkeley,  though  he,  to  be  sure,  gave  it  a  place  in  the 
Di\'ine  ]Mind  during  the  intervals  of  its  perception  by  finite 
minds.  In  this  New  Ideahsm  the  doctrine  is  modified.  All 
being  or  fact  is  made  psychical,  but  it  is  maintained  that  we 
are  not  to  look  for  anything  psychical,  above  all  not  for  any- 
thing of  this  sort,  save  in  the  minds  of  finite  creatures  of 
various  orders."  These,  however,  collaborating  -^^th  one 
another,  and  between  their  percei\ing  and  their  thinking, 
may  very  well  save  the  mountain  from  an  intermittent  and 
staccato  existence,  guaranteeing  it  an  independence  of  each, 
if  not  of  all. 

Physical  nature  is,  thus,  saved,  so  far ;  but  is  assigned  a 
properly  subordinate  place.  And  this  is  a  matter  of  vast 
significance.  We  may  not  say  that,  in  the  histor}'  of  the 
Universe,  matter  came  before  mind,  the  inorganic  before  the 
organic ;  this  is  manifestly  absurd.^  In  so  far  as  there  is  a 
world  at  all,  it  is  a  world  of  sentience,  and  the  materiahst  is 
brought  to  his  knees. 

There  was  much  that  promised  comfort  in  Berkeley.  He. 
too,  confounded  the  materialist,  after  his  own  fashion ;  and, 
expelling  from  existence  the  world  of  "inert,  senseless  matter," 
he  revealed  to  us  a  gorgeous  World  of  Ideas.  Nature  was 
transfigured  and  yet  remained  Nature.  It  was  penetrated 
with  a  new  radiance,  was  charged  with  the  perfume  of  a  new 
significance  —  it  acquired  the  dignity  of  a  Divine  Language, 
unveiHng,  in  its  beauty,  order,  and  harmony,  the  thoughts  and 
purposes  of  God.  Berkeley's  ideas  of  sense,  known  to  the 
vulgar  as  material  things,  did  not  strike  him  as  unreal  or  in 


A    World  of  the  New  Idealism  187 

any  wise  absurd.  He  would  have  been  the  last  to  accuse 
the  Divine  Revelation  of  incoherence,  although  he  would 
have  been  among  the  first  to  admit  the  hmitations  of  human 
knowledge  and  to  claim  but  an  imperfect  comprehension  of 
the  Heavenly  Message.  Our  neophyte  takes  heart  of  grace 
at  finding  himself  not  wholly  cut  off  from  the  respectable 
company  of  Berkeley;  and,  in  spite  of  inward  qualms,  he 
accepts  without  open  revolt  the  patchwork  psychical  existence 
of  the  dubious  mountain.  It  is  at  least  a  weapon  of  offense 
against  the  materialist. 

But  a  further  initiation  into  this  new  IdeaHsm  fills  him  with 
dismay.  Berkeley  vanishes  like  a  ghost  in  the  light  of  the  new 
revelation.  Our  truth-seeker  is  brought  to  see  that  minds  and 
their  ideas  are  alike  false  and  unreal  appearances,  "infected" 
with  incurable  disease,  dying  daily  by  virtue  of  their  own  self- 
contradictory  natures.  There  can  be  no  talk  of  beauty,  order, 
and  harmony.  The  Divine  Language  has  become  mere 
incoherence,  and  no  word  or  sentence  in  it  has  any  sense  or 
meaning. 

Thus,  things  must  have  qualities  and  must  stand  in  relations, 
or  they  are  nothing ;  but  things,  qualities,  and  relations  are 
all  equally  absurd.^  Nothing  can  be  extended  in  space, 
nor  yet  have  continuance  in  time.  Its  own  inconsistency  is 
the  condemnation  of  space,  and  time  is  helplessly  dissolved. ^° 
Motion,  change,  and  the  perception  of  them  naturally  become, 
under  the  circumstances,  impossible ;  and  causality  is  a  con- 
ception to  be  held  in  derision. ^^  Power,  force,  energy,  and 
activity  carmot  bear  scrutiny, ^^  Hence,  "things,"  when 
critically  examined,  are  seen  to  be  "undermined  and  ruined."  ^^ 

"Things"  having  crumbled  into  relations  that  can  find  no 
terms,  and  having  gone  to  pieces,  it  remains  to  see  whether 
there  can  be  saved  from  the  wreck  of  Berkeley's  world  of 
spirits  and  ideas,  at  least,  the  spirits.  But  here  the  situation 
is  no  less  deaperate.     The  Self  turns  out  to  be  too  full  of  con- 


1 88  The   World  We  Live  In 

tradictions  to  be  "genuine  fact";^^  and  the  existence  of  a 
plurality  of  iinite  souls  distinct  from  each  other  must  not 
be  supposed  to  be  ultimate  truth.  There  is  no  real  plurality ; 
what  seems  to  be  such  Hes  in  the  realm  of  mere  appearance 
and  error. ^^  Thus,  everything,  the  admittedly  psychical  as 
well  as  what  is  vulgarly  called  physical,  turns  out  to  be  incon- 
sistent with  itself  and  visibly  totters  to  its  fall. 

In  this  general  wreck  and  ruin  the  fate  of  the  mountain  is 
sealed.  To  be  a  mountain  at  all,  it  must  have  qualities,  and 
must  stand  in  relations  to  valleys  and  plains ;  this  it  cannot  do. 
It  must  be  high  or  low,  and  yet  it  cannot  be  either,  for  all 
extension  in  space  is  sheer  absurdity.  It  is  forced  to  have  a 
past,  and  yet  its  past  will  not  bear  looking  into,  and  had  better 
not  be  uncovered.  It  never  has  undergone,  and  it  never  will 
undergo,  anything  so  ridiculous  as  change.  To  talk  of  it  as 
caused  or  as  uncaused  is  equally  out  of  the  question.  Its 
fantastic  apparent  being  cannot  really  be  bolstered  up  by 
the  involuntary  cooperation  of  a  plurality  of  finite  minds,  for 
no  one  of  these  can  really  exist  itself ;  and,  anyhow,  the  notion 
that  minds  can  exist  simultaneously  or  successively  is  to  be 
scouted. 

The  truth  —  or,  rather,  the  nearest  approach  to  the  truth 
attainable  by  us  ^^  —  is  that  the  mountain  and  the  world  to 
which  it  seems  to  belong  constitute  a  show  so  fleeting  that 
it  carmot  even  consistently  fleet.  Common  sense  and  science, 
falsely  so  called,  are  apt  to  speak  of  hill  and  dale  and  all  the 
rest  as  though  their  existence  meant  something  more  than 
this ;  but  any  serious  theory  must  in  some  points  collide  with 
common  sense,  and  the  object  of  the  sciences  is  not  at  all  the 
ascertainment  of  ultimate  truth. ^^ 

So  passes  the  World  of  the  Old  Idealism.  The  "beauty, 
order,  extent,  and  variety  of  natural  things"  have  been  under- 
mined; the  "magnificence,  beauty,  and  perfection  of  the 
larger,  and  the  exquisite  contrivance  of  the  smaller  parts  of 


A    World  of  the  New  Idealism  189 

the  creation,  together  with  the  exact  harmony  and  corre- 
spondence of  the  whole, "  have  disappeared  as  a  vapor. ^^  Our 
novice  can  no  longer  take  pleasure  in  green  pastures  and  still 
waters.  He  suspects  the  greenness  of  the  one,  and  he  sees 
that  the  stillness  of  the  other  must  be  infected  by  temporal 
succession.  To  the  metaphysician  he  has  been  accustomed  to 
allow  a  certain  latitude  of  thought  and  speech;  but  a  pro- 
found discontent,  born  of  a  long  familiarity  with  Everybody's 
World,  where  appearances,  although  they  appear,  do  not  all 
seem  to  bear  a  bad  character,  finally  precipitates  revolt. 

"We,  too,"  he  remarks,  after  reflection,  "have  in  New  York, 
our  museum  of  curiosities.  A  spiral  mathematical  point,  a 
pentagonal  straight  line,  an  oval  square  circle,  a  sour  blue 
sound,  an  ear-splitting  silent  smile,  the  present  perception  of 
to-morrow's  sun,  nobody's  thoughts  of  real  nothings  —  these 
and  many  more  as  strange  stand  on  exhibition  in  the  cases." 

"Stop!"  interposes  an  interested  and  better  initiated  by- 
stander. "Such  things  as  these  cannot  be  there,  for  they 
cannot  exist  even  as  appearance.     This  is  pure  illusion." 

"They  may  not  exist  in  Oxford,"  retorts  the  American,  "but 
transfer  yourself  to  my  country,  to 

"  '  Happy  climes  where,  from  the  genial  sun 
And  virgin  earth  such  scenes  ensue.' 

There  one  may  expect  palpable  absurdities;  'not  such  as 
Europe  breeds  in  her  decay ' ;  not  appearances  which  appear 
self- contradictory  and  absurd  only  after  they  have  passed 
through  the  hands  of  some  philosopher,  and  are  open  to  the 
suspicion  that  they  have  been  tampered  with  and  are  not 
genuine  curios;  but  such  as  need  no  medium,  no  cabinet,  no 
half-Hghts,  and  which  at  once  proclaim  their  absurdity  to 
all  comers.  Ours  annihilate  themselves  openly  and  in  the 
light  of  day.  The  spectacle  may  be  enjoyed  without  pre- 
vious preparation,  and  at  a  merely  nominal  expense ;  it  is 
within  the  reach  of  everybody's  purse." 


190  The   World  We  Live  In 

"You  have  fallen  into  a  confusion,"  is  the  rejoinder.  "You 
do  not  discriminate  properly  between  absurdities  and  absurd- 
ities. Those  which  are  too  palpably  absurd  cannot  even 
appear,  and  may  simply  be  left  out  of  account.^^  Those,  on 
the  other  hand,  that  do  not  appear  absurd  to  men  generally, 
that  are  not  regarded  with  suspicion  by  science,  that  deceive 
by  their  outward  show  of  respectability  even  a  large  number  of 
philosophers  by  profession  —  such  can  secretly  and  unob- 
trusively annihilate  themselves  by  inherent  self-contradiction, 
and  may  yet  appear ;  they  must  be  accepted  as  fact ;  ^°  they 
exist,-^  although  they  are  not  and  cannot  be  real.  Indeed,  of 
such  unreal  and  self-contradictory  facts  is  constructed  the 
whole  frame  of  Everybody's  World,  the  world  in  which  you 
have,  so  far,  blindly  walked.  All  these  facts  are,  to  be  sure,  a 
prey  to  self-annihilation,  but  this  self-annihilation  does  not 
imply  extrusion  from  the  realm  of  fact  and  existence ;  it 
implies  only  that  what  appears  is  not  what  appears,  but  is 
really  something  else.^^ 

"Let  us  confine  ourselves  to  appearances  whose  inconsistency 
can  be  detected  only  by  the  eye  of  the  metaphysician.  They 
are  all  infected,  it  is  true,  but  it  is  worthy  of  remark  that  there 
is  some  choice  even  within  this  realm  of  self-contradictions. 
Thus,  although  extension  and  duration  are  impossible,  and 
hence,  what  fills  space  and  exists  in  time  must  be  absurd  and 
unreal,  still,  that  which  fills  a  great  space  and  lasts  a  long  time 
is  relatively  more  real  than  the  diminutive  and  the  short- 
Uved.^  There  are  also  other  marks  which  indicate  that  some 
self-contradictory  appearances  are  to  be  preferred  before 
others.^^  Nevertheless,  Appearance  is  Appearance,  and  is, 
at  best,  unsatisfactory  and  unreal.  It  is  time  to  leave  this 
lower  realm,  and  to  turn  to  something  that  can  satisfy,  at 
least,  the  main  tendencies  of  our  nature.^'^  Have  patience. 
So  far,  the  ground  has  been  cleared.  But  the  best  is  yet  to 
come." 


A    World  of  tJie  New  Idealism  191 

That  best  turns  out  to  be  the  substitution  for  Everybody's 
World,  now  discredited,  undermined  and  ruined,  of  the 
Reality,  the  Universe,  the  Whole,  the  Absolute.  This  rises 
upon  the  scene  of  the  wreck,  and  is  constructed  of  the  old 
materials.  But  in  the  new  edifice  they  undergo  a  change 
and  become  transfigured. 

The  foundation  is  laid  in  the  fact  that  appearances,  self- 
contradictory  as  they  are,  are  not  non-existent.  They  must, 
as  existent,  fall  somewhere ;  and  where  should  they  fall,  if 
not  in  Reality  ?  To  suppose  them  existing  somehow  and  some- 
where in  the  unreal  is  quite  meaningless.-^  Appearance  must 
live  in  and  belong  to  Reality,  and  Reality  apart  from  all 
appearance  would  be  nothing.-'' 

And  now  for  the  nature  of  Reality.  Is  it  not  at  once  evi- 
dent that  Reality  cannot  contradict  itself  ?  How  can  the  self- 
contradictory  be  real  ?  But  to  be  self-consistent  Reality 
must  reject  inconsistency,  and  that  which  rejects  inconsistency 
works.  Observing  it  at  its  work,  we  attain  to  a  positive 
knowledge  of  the  nature  of  Reality.^^ 

So  far,  however,  we  have  but  an  empty  outline.  We  must 
fill  it  in.  With  what?  With  the  only  kind  of  stuff  that 
exists  at  all  —  with  psychical  stuff,  sentient  experienced^ 
And  this  stuff  must  be  found  in  finite  minds  or  "centers  of 
experience."  We  may  assume  that  there  is  enough  matter 
here  to  furnish  all  its  content  to  Reality .^'^ 

The  stuff  "as  such"  is,  to  be  sure,  very  poor.  It  is  infected 
throughout.  But  it  is  not  "as  such"  that  it  is  employed  in 
the  new  construction.  In  the  fires  of  free  skeptical  inquiry 
its  dross  is  purged  away.  Stone  is  no  longer  stone,  mortar 
is  no  longer  mortar,  wood  is  no  longer  wood.  In  entering 
into  the  whole,  each  has  sacrificed  every  characteristic  which 
distinguished  it  from  anything  else ;  there  is  "an  all-pervasive 
transfusion  with  a  reblending  of  all  material "  ;  things,  as  such, 
are  "  transmuted  and  have  lost  their  individual  natures."  ^^ 


192  The   World  We  Live  In 

The  transformation  is  most  thoroughgoing.  The  psychical 
stufif  which  is  to  furnish  its  content  to  Reahty  must  be  tran- 
scended and  merged.^-  The  distinction  between  psychical  and 
physical,  as  well  as  the  barriers  which  separate  one  soul  from 
another,  must  be  done  away.^^  Space  must  lose  its  impossible 
extension,  and  time  its  inconceivable  succession.  In  the 
interests  of  harmony  and  consistency  all  quaKties  and  relations, 
as  such,  must  be  suppressed. ^^  Indeed,  aU  differences  must 
come  together,  and  all  distinctions  be  fused. ^^  It  is  to  the 
attainment  of  this  consummation  that  Reality  works. 

And  having  timelessly  done  its  perfect  work,  it  looms 
vaguely  ^^  before  us  as  the  Universe,  the  Whole,  the  Absolute. 
To  speak  of  it  in  fitting  language  is  not  easy.  It  is  One,  but 
not  one  in  the  usual  sense  of  the  word,  which  contrasts  the  one 
with  the  many.^^  It  is  a  ''compensating  system  of  conspiring 
particulars,"  ^^  which  are  not,  strictly  speaking,  particulars, 
which  stand  in  no  relations,  and  which  are  distinguished  by 
no  difi'erences.  It  is  the  \Miole,  beyond  which  there  is  nothing.^^ 
and  yet  it  seems  that  nothing  is  in  it  "as  such."  *°  Falling 
within  it,  appearances,  as  such,  cease  ;^^  yet  this  annihilation 
itself  seems  to  be  empty  appearance,  for  nothing  can  be  lost, 
and  the  private  character  of  everj^thing  still  remains  ^-  to  en- 
rich^^  somehow  with  detail  the  diversity  of  the  incomprehensible 
unity  and  to  prevent  its  being  a  flat  monotony.^  Although  a 
Whole,  it  has  no  parts,  and  in  every  unreal  finite  center  arising 
from  its  inexplicable  di\-ision,  it  is  present  as  a  whole.^^  With 
this  Reality  we  have  direct  contact ;  we  feel  it  burningly  in 
the  one  focus  of  our  own  personal  experience  and  sensation.^ 

How  materials  so  hopelessly  infected  with  a  self-contra- 
dictory "as  such"  can  be  supplemented,  transformed,  tran- 
scended, transmuted,  overridden,  absorbed,  and  suppressed 
into  an  Absolute  which,  apart  from  appearances,  is  nothing,^^ 
and  which  must  "inhabit"  appearances,^  while  keeping  itself 
clear  of  aU  that  makes  them  what  they  are ;  how  appearances 


A    World  of  the  New  Idealism  193 

are  made  to  cease,  and,  nevertheless,  allowed  to  remain  —  to 
know  all  this,  in  detail,  is  beyond  us ;  it  is  accomplished 
"somehow,"  "we  know  not  how."^^  Our  knowledge  extends 
but  a  little  way ;  but  we  should,  at  least,  avoid  degrading 
Reality  to  the  rank  of  mere  Appearance. 

Thus,  we  must  understand  that  it  is  not,  properly  speaking, 
an  experience,  and  is  not  a  person. ^°  It  is  not  good,  for  good- 
ness is  self-contradictory.^^  It  is  neither  moral,  nor  beautiful, 
nor  true.^^  Happy  it  is  not,  for  its  pleasantness  is  blended 
beyond  recognition.^^  Nor  must  it  be  regarded  as  Divine. 
Here  it  is  necessary  to  supplement  the  inadequate  statement 
made  at  the  outset,  namely,  that  in  the  study  of  metaphysics 
we  have  a  principal  way  of  experiencing  the  Deity.  Religion 
naturally  implies  a  relation  between  man  and  God,  and  this 
is  self-contradictory.^^  Metaphysics  has  no  special  connection 
with  genuine  religion.^^  The  God  of  religion,  critically  con- 
sidered, turns  out  to  be  either  inconsistent  emptiness  or  dis- 
tracted finitude.^^ 

But,  should  all  this  appear  discouraging,  there  is  comfort 
to  be  taken  in  the  thought  that  the  Universe  is  not  "behind" 
appearances,  and  making  a  sport  of  us."  It  is  "above"  and 
"beyond"  them.^^  Such  matters  are  not  precisely  intelhgible, 
but  that  is  not  to  be  expected.  No  aspect  of  things  is  intel- 
ligible. When  they  have  become  intelhgible,  they  have  ceased 
as  such  to  be.^^  Nevertheless,  in  the  vague  and  abstractly 
grasped  notion  that  the  Universe  is  not  behind  things,  making  a 
sport  of  us,  but  is  above  and  beyond  them,  feeding  us  with 
appearances,  is  there  not  something  that  supports  and  hum- 
bles, chastens  and  transports  one  ? 

"Transported,  I  find  myself,"  retorts  the  infected  citizen 
of  Everybody's  World,  "but  chastened,  never!  I  have 
clearly  been  robbed  of  my  all.  Our  commonplace  materiaUsm 
offered  me  something  hke  a  world,  at  least ;  and  our  traditional 
theology  seemed  to  offer  me  something  more.     Since  there  is, 


194  '^^^^   World  We  Live  hi 

as  it  would  appear,  such  potency  in  a  'somehow,'  why  may  I 
not  have  recourse  to  it  to  piece  out  the  deficiencies  of  the  one 
or  the  other  of  these,  and  thus  be  not  wholly  bereft  ?  In  the 
new  doctrine,  the  world  has  gone  to  pieces ;  and,  as  for  the 
Absolute,  /  believe  it  to  be  no  better  than  a  word. 

"Appearances,  as  such,  I  am  told  have  no  reaHty;  the 
ReaHty,  as  such,  cannot  appear,  for  then  it  would  be  self- 
contradictory.  They  must  be  brought  together  by  violence  — 
the  appearances  must  be  made  to  lose  their  indi\'idual  natures. 
The  operation  is  inconceivable.  I  appeal  to  Mr.  Bradley : 
'A  God  which  has  to  make  things  what  otherwise,  and  by 
their  own  nature,  they  are  not,  may  summarily  be  dismissed 
as  an  exploded  absurdity'  —  a  detis  ex  machina.  We  are  not 
called  upon  to  consider  this  well-worn  contrivance.®"  Is  it 
otherwise  with  the  Absolute  ?  Hence,  everything  of  which 
we  seem  to  have  experience  must,  after  all,  fall,  if  it  falls  at  all, 
somehow  and  somewhere  in  the  region  of  the  unreal.  So 
passes  the  Absolute,  with  the  unreal  world  which  it  is  sup- 
posed to  'inhabit.'" 

With  this  revolt  of  the  natural  man,  plain  men  who  have  a 
weakness  for  feeHng  some  sort  of  ground  beneath  their  feet 
cannot  be  out  of  s^Tnpathy.  Nor,  for  that  matter,  can  the 
philosopher,  so  long  as  the  philosopher  retains  some  respect 
for  common  sense  and  for  science,  and  views  with  suspicion 
the  demoHtion  of  Everybody's  World.  For  this  is  no  less  than 
a  demolition.  The  world  has  not  been  illuminated  and 
transfigured  ;  it  has  been  destroyed  ;  and  nothing  —  absolutely 
nothing,  —  save  a  word,  has  been  put  in  its  place. 

Is  it  surprising  that  the  issue  should  be  discontent  ?  The 
wound  in  the  patient's  intellectual  nature  has  been  torn  in 
the  probing  until  even  the  plaster  of  a  "somehow"  seems 
hopelessly  inadequate  to  cover  the  whole  of  it.  The  mutila- 
tion which  distressed  him  has  not  been  healed  but  has  ended 
in  a  more  distressing  deformity.     He  was  a  seeker  after  God, 


A    World  of  the  N'ew  Idealism  195 

and  he  has  found  in  metaphysics  a  principal  way  of  experi- 
encing either  inconsistent  emptiness  or  distracted  finitude, 
while  vaguely  conceiving  something  still  higher  to  which  he 
can  attach  many  names  but  no  meaning.  Why  should  he  be 
content  ?  What  right  has  he,  the  walking  self-contradiction, 
the  unreal  appearance,  the  infected  apparition,  to  demand 
satisfaction!  Nevertheless,  he  had  hopes,  and  they  have  not 
been  fulfilled ;  he  was  promised  something,  and  he  has  received 
nothing  at  all.     The  result  is  disillusion. 

To  the  philosopher,  who  watches  with  a  critical  eye  the 
operations  which  this  New  IdeaHsm  performs  upon  Every- 
body's World,  there  presents  itself  with  much  insistence  the 
question,  How  is  it  possible  that  any  one  could  be  persuaded 
to  look  for  consolation  and  satisfaction  as  a  result  of  this 
process  of  destruction  and  verbal  substitution  ?  The  answer 
which  seems  unavoidable  is  that  the  true  nature  and  outcome 
of  the  process  is  concealed  from  view  by  a  veil  of  words 
and  images.  Berkeley  talked  sometimes  of  a  Di\ine  Lan- 
guage ;  but  he  himself  used  plain  English,  and  took  pains  to 
be  understood.  In  this  New  Ideahsm,  however,  there  is 
employed  throughout  a  language  which  differs  so  widely  from 
ordinary  human  speech  that  it  can  scarcely  fail  to  create 
misconception  and  illusion. 

Thus,  when  men  contrast  "appearance"  and  ''reality,"  as 
they  constantly  do,  and  give  the  preference  to  the  latter,*  they 
never  mean  by  reality  anything  in  the  faintest  degree  re- 
sembhng  what  is  called  "  Reahty  "  above.  The  "  wholes  " 
of  which  men  speak  have  parts,  and  are  composed  of  their 
parts.  The  "  systems "  which  they  construct,  or  wish  to 
construct,  are  never  free  from  internal  distinctions  and  re- 
lations. The  most  complete  "  harmony"  is  not  thought  to 
entail  the  ruin  and  disappearance  of  the  things  harmonized. 
No  one  dreams  of  calling  "  rich,"  and  full  of  "  treasures," 

*  See  Chapter  Xn. 


196  The   World  We  Live  In 

what  has  carefully  been  emptied  of  all  variety  of  content. 
The  self-contradictory  and  impossible  are  not  labeled  "  fact," 
and  it  occurs  to  no  one  to  assign  them  "  existence."  The 
"Universe"  in  which  men  are  interested,  and  about  which 
they  speculate,  is  the  universe  to  which  the  choir  of  heaven 
and  furniture  of  the  earth,  as  such,  belong.  Any  other  uni- 
verse they  regard  as  an  idle  dream;  and  any  universe  which 
could  be  wholly  but  indescribably  in  each  of  its  own  unreal 
parts,  they  would  reject  as  a  nightmare. 

It  is,  hence,  by  a  systematic  misuse  of  words  which  have 
an  accepted  meaning  that  this  New  Ideahsm  creates  the  illu- 
sion that  it  is  busying  itself  about  something  of  interest  to 
mankind.  Men  care  vastly  to  increase  their  knowledge  of 
the  system  of  things;  to  find  out  more  about  the  universe  of 
which  science  offers  us  an  inadequate  revelation;  to  avoid 
error,  and  to  attain,  as  well  as  they  may,  to  a  knowledge  of 
reahties.  And  many  men  find  absorbing  the  problem  whether 
the  great  system,  of  which  they  find  hemselves  an  insignifi- 
cant part,  is  in  any  sense  a  revelation  of  a  Divine  Mind. 
But  their  interest  is  not  in  mere  words,  and  in  words  wrested 
from  their  natural  meaning.  The  associations  which  persist 
in  clinging  to  such  may  deceive  some  for  awhile,  and  may 
succeed  in  stirring  emotion.  Disillusion,  however,  seems 
inevitable,  in  the  case  of  those  who  do  not  merely  feel,  but 
think,  and  try  to  think  clearly. 

Perhaps  it  will  be  said  that  clear  thought  and  accurate 
speech  are  out  of  place  in  dcahng  with  what  lies  on  the 
confines  of  human  knowledge,  or  beyond  them;  that  words  fail 
to  describe  what  only  an  abuse  of  speech,  reheved  by  metaphor, 
can  faintly  adumbrate.  Thus,  a  multitude  of  questions,  and 
very  disagreeable  ones,  can,  it  seems,  be  raised  by  the  common- 
place carping  mind  when  anything  is  said  about  the  Absolute 
at  all.  But  why  not  abandon  frankly  all  attempt  at  accurate 
speech,  admit  one's  inconsistency  freely,  and  approach  the 


A    World  of  the  New  Idealism  197 

subject  with  the  generous  looseness  of  metaphor  ?  WTiy  not 
say,  for  example:  "The  Absolute  has  no  seasons,  but  all  at 
once  bears  its  leaves,  fruit,  and  blossoms.  Like  our  globe,  it 
always  and  it  never  has  summer  and  winter  "  ?  ^^  May  we  not 
accept  this  as  poetry,  even  if  it  condemns  itself  as  science? 

To  this,  I  am  compelled  to  give  the  answer,  that,  in  the  first 
place,  the  New  Ideahsm  does  not  present  itself  merely  as 
poetry,  and  in  the  second,  even  poetry  is  not  without  its 
hampering  restrictions.  "That  is  the  bitterness  of  arts," 
complained  Somerset,  when  the  sonorous  word  "orotunda" 
was  rejected  by  his  poetry ;  "you  see  a  good  effect  and  some 
nonsense  about  sense  continually  intervenes." 

Before  closing  tliis  chapter,  I  wish  to  repeat  that  the  doctrine 
it  discusses  is  a  New  IdeaUsm,  and  there  are  others  which 
differ  from  it  widely.  And  I  feel  like  recording  the  conviction 
that  any  support  and  comfort  which  has  been  found  in  it  has 
never  come  from  the  doctrine  "as  such."  It  flows  rather  from 
a  source  of  inspiration  from  which  the  accomphshed  author, 
many  other  philosophers,  and  many  theologians,  orthodox  or 
the  reverse,  have  all  stooped  to  drink.  Some  have  been 
realists,  some  idealists,  and  there  are  those  that  have  given  an 
uncertain  sound ;  but  they  have  drunk  at  the  same  spring, 
and  they  have  risen  to  go  away  refreshed.  They  speak 
various  tongues,  and  there  is  dispute  among  them ;  but  one 
sees  that  they  walk  together,  even  though  they  are  not  agreed. 

Sometimes  a  man  means  more  than  he  says ;  sometimes  he 
says  more  than  he  means ;  sometimes  he  does  both.  To  insist 
that  he  means  what  he  does  not  say,  appears  to  be  an  imper- 
tinence ;  to  hold  him  strictly  to  what  he  says  may  seem,  at 
times,  ungenerous.  But  when  we  are  discussing  a  system  of 
doctrine,  and  not  a  man  —  who  may,  indeed,  be  much  more 
than  his  system  —  it  seems  prudent  to  keep  in  view  what  has 
actually  been  written,  rather  than  what  we  think  might  very 
well  have  been  written. 


CHAPTER  XIV 

ANOTHER  WORLD   OF  THE   NEW  IDEALISM 

Is  not  a  tendency  to  hasty  generalization  admittedly  the 
weakness  of  the  American  visiting  Europe  ?  Our  seeker  for 
truth  does  not  wait  to  find  out  whether  Oxford  has  something 
better  to  ofi'er  him.  He  incontinently  takes  his  departure 
from  the  scene  of  his  disillusionment.     "No,  no,"  he  remarks: 

"  God's  in  his  Heaven, 
For  all's  wrong  with  the  World  — 

that  is  not  even  good  poetry ;  and  its  deficiencies  become 
glaringly  apparent  when  one  realizes  that  God  is  unknowable 
in  his  own  nature,  and  the  heaven  he  '  inhabits  '  is  a  purgatory 
to  which  no  shade  can  be  admitted  without  first  proving  itself 
to  be  a  logical  monstrosity." 

He  returns  to  America  ;  and,  Oxford  suggesting  Cambridge, 
he  betakes  himself  to  the  famous  university  near  Boston. 
More  seems  to  be  offered  him  there  than  he  can  expect  to  obtain 
elsewhere. 

Being  a  reader,  he  is  aware  how  Berkeley  burned  his  fingers 
in  pla>dng  \vith  the  word  "Idea,"  and  his  late  experiences  at 
Oxford  have  rendered  him  more  mistrustful  than  ever  of  the 
attractive  title  "Idealism."  Nevertheless,  his  everyday  world 
does  not  seem  to  him  wholly  ideal,  nor  does  it  give  at  once 
unequivocally  satisfactory  answers  to  all  the  questions  he 
would  like  to  address  to  it.  If  he  can  get  a  better  world  in  place 
of  it,  why  not  risk  the  attempt  ? 

For,  indeed,  great  things  are  promised.  Not  all  the  leeks 
and  onions  of  the  Eg}'pt  in  which  he  has  been  condemned  to 
pass  his  days  so  far  can  weigh  for  a  moment  as  against  the 

198 


Afiother  World  of  the  New  Idealism         199 

milk  and  honey  of  the  Promised  Land,  the  road  to  which  is 
mapped  before  him.  He  must  fly,  it  is  true ;  he  must  raise 
himself  on  the  wings  of  dialectic  to  heights  as  yet  unknown  to 
him.  But  he  will  not  be  without  guidance  —  has  he  not  both 
a  Hving  teacher  and  a  volume  of  instructions  comprising  more 
than  a  thousand  pages  ?  ^ 

Great  things,  I  say,  are  promised.  He  is  to  arrive  at  a 
demonstrative  knowledge  that  God  exists  as  a  Perfect  Being 
whose  Will  is  eternally  accomplished.  He  is  to  be  shown  that 
the  World  is  not  dead  and  mechanical,  but  is  everywhere 
instinct  with  Hfe,  nay,  that  it  is  a  Life  in  which  his  Httle  hfe 
may  feel  at  home.  Moreover,  he  will  see  that  he  is  not,  and 
cannot  be,  a  link  in  a  causal  series,  but  is  Free.  He  will  rejoice 
in  the  discovery  that  his  griefs  and  sorrows,  his  shortcomings 
and  his  sins  will  be  transcended  and  made  good,  and  his  own 
real  will,  which  is  identical  with  God's  wiU,  must  be  completely 
satisfied.  That  last  of  terrors.  Death,  will  spread  his  sable 
wings  and  disappear,  for  it  will  be  proved  that  Death  is  but  an 
incident  in  a  fuller  life,  and  is  but  an  apparent  evil.  No  more 
tentative  gropings ;  no  more  hopes  half  smothered  by  fears ; 
in  place  of  the  twihght  of  faith  in  which  men  have  walked, 
struggHng  up  the  Hill  Difhculty  in  doubt  and  perplexity,  the 
clear  Hght  of  demonstrative  evidence,  and  encouragement  from 
those  respectable  witnesses,  the  mathematicians.  More  than 
this,  one  could  scarcely  ask. 

To  the  dweller  in  Everybody's  World  the  strangest  part  of  it 
is  that  all  this  can  be  had  hterally  for  a  song.  One  must,  to 
be  sure,  reflect  upon  the  song,  and  get  out  of  it  all  that  is 
latent  in  it.  It  is  not  every  one  who  is  capable  of  conducting 
such  reflections  to  a  successful  issue.  Our  novice  applies 
himself  with  diligence  to  the  volume  of  instructions,  and, 
finding  himself  in  some  perplexity  still,  he  presents  himself 
before  one  who  has  already  accomplished  the  journey,  is 
supposed  to  be  familiar  with  the  route,  and  may,  perhaps, 


200  The   World  We  Live  In 

save  him  from  errors  of  oversight  and  from  lack  of  compre- 
hension. 

"Everything,"  he  is  told  at  the  outset,  "will  depend  upon 
the  fundamental  questions  :  'What  is  an  idea  ?  '  and  'How  can 
an  idea  be  related  to  Reality  ?  '  ^  In  answering  these  questions 
we  must  begin  by  noticing  that  every  idea  has  meaning  or 
purpose,  and  is  not  merely  something  which  concerns  the 
intellect ;  it  is  in  every  case  an  expression  of  will.  It  is  the 
inner  purpose  of  an  idea,  its  internal  meaning,  that  con- 
stitutes the  idea's  primary  and  essential  feature.^  This 
internal  meaning  is  nothing  else  than  the  purpose  embodied 
in  an  idea."* 

"Now,  ideas  have  not  only  an  internal  meaning,  but  they 
have  what  appears  to  be  an  external  meaning.  That  is  to  say, 
they  have  their  objects,  and  they  seem  to  refer  beyond  them- 
selves. In  this  sense  I  say  :  '  The  melody  sung  by  me  not  only 
is  an  idea  internally  meaning  the  embodiment  of  my  purpose  at 
the  instant  when  I  sing  it,  but  also  is  an  idea  that  means,  and 
that  in  this  sense  externally  means,  the  object  called,  say,  a 
certain  theme  which  Beethoven  composed.'^  In  the  same 
sense,  when  you  think  of  your  absent  friend,  you  fulfill  an  inner 
purpose  by  getting  the  idea  present  to  your  mind.  But 
you  also  regard  your  idea  of  him  as,  in  an  external  sense, 
meaning  the  real  being  called  your  friend,  in  so  far  as  it  refers 
to  him  and  resembles  him.  The  external  meaning  appears  to 
be  very  different  from  the  internal,  and  to  transcend  it.® 

"The  external  meanings  of  ideas  are  conveniently  and 
popularly  conceived  as  something  quite  separate  from  the 
ideas,  and  which  the  ideas  must  imitate,  if  we  are  to  arrive 
at  truth.  The  notion  that  the  idea  and  its  object  are,  indeed, 
sundered  is  erroneous,  as  we  shall  soon  see.  Nevertheless,  it 
is  convenient  to  speak,  for  certain  purposes,  as  though  they 
were.^ 

"These  preliminaries  settled,"  continues  the  speaker,  "let 


Another  World  of  the  New  Idealism         201 

us  come  back  to  the  song  under  discussion.  Suppose  you  sing 
a  song.  Good.  In  the  song  which  you  decided  to  sing,  and 
to  which  you  have  actually  treated  me,  you  have  a  purpose 
embodied  in  the  passing  moment,  an  internal  meaning.  But 
that  is  by  no  means  all.  Here  you  may  begin  to  spread  your 
wings. 

"Did  you  not  purpose  to  sing  ihat  song  —  that,  and  no 
other  ?  Was  it  not  composed  by  Beethoven  ?  Then,  did  you 
not,  if  you  purposed  to  sing  thai  song,  purpose  to  sing  a  com- 
position by  Beethoven  ?  And,  of  course,  that  implies  the 
existence  of  Beethoven,  who  was  a  particular  man,  not  a 
floating  abstraction.  He,  in  his  turn,  implies  parents,  a  house, 
a  city,  a  state,  the  round  world,  the  starry  heavens,  a  stupen- 
dous past,  and  an  endless  future.  Could  that  song  be  just 
that  song  if  it  were  not  a  song  composed  by  a  particular  man, 
in  a  particular  place,  at  a  particular  time,  all  of  which  par- 
ticulars are  rendered  determinate  only  by  their  place  in  a  great 
system  of  things  which  identifies  each  as  itself  and  not  another  ? 
Remember,  you  purposed  to  sing  that  song,  not  an  abstraction, 
but  that  song.  Viewed  thus  reflectively,  that  song  spreads, 
as  every  fragment  of  fact  must  spread,  until  it  embraces  every- 
thing in  heaven  and  upon  the  earth.  The  things  which  have 
appeared  external,  and  seemingly  beyond  your  reach,  are  only 
apparently  external.  *We  draw  our  breath  in  pain  '  while  we 
sunder  internal  meanings  from  external  meanings.  But, 
attaining  to  insight,  we  see  that  all  that  seems  to  be  external 
to  anything  else  is  not  really  external.  It  is  only  an  aspect  of 
the  internal  meaning  of  every  idea,  however  fragmentary.^ 

"In  order  that  you  may  see  clearly  that  the  object  of  an 
idea  cannot  really  be  external  to  the  idea,  let  me  call  your 
attention  to  a  very  significant  truth.  Suppose  that,  when  I 
asked  you  to  sing  a  song,  you  had  purposed  to  sing  a  composi- 
tion by  Verdi,  but  that,  through  some  defect  in  your  nervous 
system  —  such  things  may  happen  —  your  tongue  had  uttered 


202  The   World  We  Live  In 

what  you  did  not  intend,  and  you  had  actually  sung  a  song  by 
Beethoven.  Would,  in  this  case,  the  song  sung  be  the  object 
of  the  purpose  you  had  in  mind  ?  ^ 

"Do  you  not  see  that  every  idea  must  intend  its  object,  if 
the  thing  really  is  to  be  Us  object,  and  not  something  indifferent 
to  it  ?  The  object  of  an  idea  must  be  predetermined  by  the 
idea,  if  it  is  to  be  the  external  meaning  of  that  idea,  and  it  must 
thus  be  predetermined  in  every  particular.  An  idea  can  be 
judged  only  by  what  it  intends. ^°  'What  the  idea  always 
aims  to  find  in  its  object  is  notliing  whatever  but  the  idea's 
own  conscious  purpose  or  will,  embodied  in  some  more  deter- 
minate form  than  the  idea  by  itself  alone  at  the  time  consciously 
possesses.' ^^  One's  true  wdll  is  'one's  present  imperfect  con- 
scious win  in  some  more  determinate  form.'^-  In  seeking  its 
object,  any  idea  whatever  seeks  absolutely  nothing  but  its 
o^vn  explicit,  and,  in  the  end,  complete,  determination  as  this 
conscious  purpose,  embodied  in  tliis  one  way.  The  complete 
content  of  the  idea's  own  purpose  is  the  only  object  of  which 
the  idea  can  ever  take  note.  Tliis  alone  is  the  Other  that 
is  sought. ^^ 

"It  follows  thus,  that  when  you  purposed  to  sing  that  song, 
your  purpose  was  vastly  more  significant  than  you  heedlessly 
imagined  it  to  be.  It  really  embraced  implicitly  the  whole 
Universe,  the  only  Reality,  the  Absolute,  or  God.^"*  God, 
assumed  by  the  unreflective  to  be  external  to  and  far  from  us, 
is  given  in  your  own  internal  meaning,  when  you  do  no  more 
than  sing  a  song." 

"You  appall  me,"  interposes  the  astonished  listener.  "Di<^ 
I  really  accomplish  all  tliis  ?  It  suggests  to  me  the  expansion 
of  the  Jinn  released  from  the  bottle  by  the  fisherman.  Not- 
^\^thstanding  the  argument,  I  do  not  seem  to  see  clearly  how 
Beethoven's  father  is  to  be  extracted  from  a  given  song  by 
merely  developing  its  internal  meaning.  I  must  take  time  to 
reflect  upon  the  matter.     But  first  let  us  consider  a  difficulty, 


Another  World  of  tlie  New  Idealism         203 

touching  the  injiniie  spread  of  the  song,  which  has  seemed  to  me 
a  serious  one. 

"Granted  that  'the  thinking  process  itself  is  a  process 
whereby  at  once  meanings  tend  to  become  determinate,  and 
external  objects  tend  to  become  internal  meanings ' ;  ^^  admit- 
ting, for  the  moment,  that  if  my  process  of  determining  my 
own  internal  meaning  simply  proceeds  to  its  own  limit,  I 
shall  face  Being,  become  one  uith  it,  and  internally  possess 
it ;  ^^  am  I  not  plainly  told  in  the  Book  that  it  is  hopeless  to 
try  to  carry  such  a  process  to  its  limit  ?  If  the  song  is  to  be 
that  song,  none  other  in  heaven  or  earth,  it  must,  I  am  given  to 
understand,  have  its  place  in  a  limitless  universe.  'Song,' 
taken  in  general,  is  abstract.  If  we  stop  anywhere  short  of  the 
infinite,  we  seem  to  have  what  is  relatively  abstract,  and  which 
needs  its  completion  and  further  determination  by  being 
assigned  a  broader  setting.  It  appears  to  follow  that  anything 
short  of  the  infinite  is  relatively  unreal.  On  the  basis  of  such 
considerations,  I  am  informed  that  only  at  the  Limit  do  we 
face  the  Real,  the  Indi\-idual  Object,  or  Being.^''  And  yet 
the  attainment  of  this  limit  is  declared  impossible.  WTio  may 
hope  by  climbing  the  golden  stair  of  the  mathematical  series 
1,1  +  ^,  i  +  ^  +  i,  etc.,  to  reach  the  heavenly  2,  toward  which 
the  stair  seems  to  ascend,  but  which  it  never  quite  attains  ?  ^^ 

"This  difficulty  is  expressly  dwelt  upon  in  the  Book.  The 
Real  is  declared  to  be  '  that  determinate  object  which  all  our 
ideas  and  experiences  try  to  decide  upon,  and  to  bring  within 
the  range  of  our  internal  meanings  ;  while,  by  the  very  na- 
ture of  our  fragm.entar}^  h}potheses  and  of  our  particular  ex- 
periences, it  always  lies  Beyond.'  '^  Never,  we  are  told,  do 
we,  in  our  human  process  of  experience,  reach  the  Reality, 
the  Universe,  God.  'It  is  for  us  the  object  of  love  and  of  hope, 
of  desire  and  of  will,  of  faith  and  of  work,  but  never  of  present 
finding.'  ^o 

"Does  it  not  seem  to  follow  of  itself  that  the  Universe  or 


204  The   World  We  Live  In 

God  is  not  really  given  in  the  purpose  to  sing  a  song,  but  is  at 
best  an  unattainable  object  of  search  ?  We  are  informed,  to  be 
sure,  that  every  finite  idea  is  consciously  in  search  of  its  own 
wholeness ;  ^^  and  that  this  wholeness,  the  object  of  the  idea, 
is  guaranteed  by  the  idea  itself  .-^  But  it  is  surely  a  problem  to 
explain  how  an  idea,  which,  on  the  surface,  appears  to  be  a 
finite  thing,  primarily  an  'internal  meaning,' can  guarantee 
to  me  the  actual  existence  of  a  limitless  Universe!  " 

"WTien  all  seems  lost,"  replies  the  guide,  "it  is  wise  to  turn 
to  the  mathematicians.  See  how  much  they  can  extract 
from  a  few  initial  definitions  ?  They  arrive  at  results  of  which 
they  had  no  inkling  at  the  outset  of  their  inquiry.  And  yet 
are  not  the  results  what  the  initial  definitions  meant  ?  ^^ 

"That  the  mathematicians  actually  can  help  us  may  be 
made  quite  plain  by  a  little  excursion  into  elementary  mathe- 
matics. Anybody  who  can  count  may  follow  the  argument, 
which  is,  indeed,  extremely  simple.  I  shall  content  myself 
with  a  single  illustration,  for  where  the  principle  is  precisely 
the  same,  one  is  as  good  as  a  dozen. 

"  Suppose  you  begin  to  count  the  whole  numbers.  You  have 
I,  2,  3,  and  so  on  without  end.  There  really  is  no  end,  no 
last  number,  either  to  God  or  to  man.^^  But  you  can  define 
the  series.  It  is  a  series  in  which  each  successive  term  is 
made  by  adding  one  unit  to  the  term  preceding.  Do  not 
attempt  to  count  the  numbers ;  you  will  always  stick  help- 
lessly in  the  finite,  if  you  go  about  things  in  that  way.  Just 
think  of  the  series  of  ivhole  numbers.  Is  not  that  serip=  infinite  ? 
Are  not  all  the  whole  numbers  '  given  at  one  stroke '  ^^  in  the  pur- 
pose to  think  of  that  series  ? 

"Do  you  not  see  that  here  'a  single  purpose,  definable  as 
One,  demands  for  its  realization  a  multitude  of  particulars 
which  could  not  be  a  limited  multitude  without  involving 
the  direct  defeat  of  the  purpose  itself '  ?  ^^  All  the  numbers, 
therefore,   exist.     Remember   that,   as  mere  validity,   as  an 


Another  World  of  the  New  Idealism         205 

unlimited  possibility  of  counting,  the  series  would  have  no  real 
Being.^''  '  If  there  is  validity,  there  is  then  an  object  more  than 
merely  valid  which  gives  the  very  conception  of  validity  its 
own  meaning.'  ^^  Thus,  the  series  of  whole  numbers  exists 
as  an  actual  completed  whole,  as  Real,  ^^  and  this  infinity  is 
given  at  one  stroke  in  the  definition.  Let  this  serve  as  an 
illustration  of  the  way  in  which  every  idea,  however  fragmen- 
tary, guarantees  the  existence  of  its  Object,  the  Unhmited 
Universe,  or  God."  '^^ 

"In  such  reasonings  I  cannot  follow  you,"  is  the  response. 
"  That  I  can  have  the  purpose  to  keep  on  adding  one  unit,  I 
can  understand.  I  have,  however,  been  informed  that  the 
Real  or  the  Beyond  is  to  be  regarded  as  the  Limit  to  the  series 
of  my  attempts  to  spread.  Here  I  am  told  that,  while  there 
is  no  Limit,  either  to  God  or  man,  yet  the  series  is  a  whole, 
is  completed,  and  has  actual  existence  as  a  completed  whole. 
These  uses  of  the  words  '  whole '  and  '  completed '  seem  strange 
to  me. 

"And  what  you  say  suggests  to  me  two  fresh  difficulties. 
I  do  not  seem  to  comprehend  how,  if  the  series  really  is  given 
at  one  stroke  in  its  definition,  and  is  not  to  be  completed  by 
counting,  my  present  thought  is  to  be  regarded  as  an  incom- 
plete embodiment  of  the  series.  Have  I  not  the  series  'at 
one  stroke  '  ?  What  more  can  even  a  Di\dne  Mind  have  ? 
It  cannot  know  the  series  up  to  the  very  end.  And  as  to  this 
perplexing  guarantee  of  actual  existence  which  seems  offered 
by  the  definition  —  let  me  illustrate  it  in  a  concrete  instance. 
Ha\'ing  just  eaten  a  cherry,  and  found  it  good,  I  resolve  that 
I  shall  eat  a  fresh  cherry  at  the  end  of  every  minute  from  now 
on,  world  without  end.  There  are  practical  difficulties  in  the 
way  of  completely  embodying  such  a  resolve,  I  admit.  The 
supply  of  cherries  may  give  out.  I  shall  certainly  die,  to 
adduce  no  other  contingency.  But  the  practical  difficulties 
of   carrying  out  such  a  resolve  are  by  no  means   greater 


2o6  The   World  We  Live  In 

than  are  those  of  producing  such  a  perfect  map  of  Eng- 
land as  is  described  by  the  learned  author  of  the  Book  — • 
a  map  which  contains  maps  -udthin  maps  in  an  endless  de- 
scending series.  Such  practical  difficulties  are  by  him  set 
aside  as  irrelevant  to  the  problem  of  the  Purpose  and  its 
Meaning.^^  Let  us  keep  to  that.  Does  every  definition  of  an 
infinite  series  guarantee  the  actual  existence  of  the  individual 
members  of  the  series?  May  I  assume  that  a  cherry  will 
somewhere  be  eaten  at  every  minute  through  future  time  in 
order  that  bloodless  Validity  may  make  way  for  breezy 
Reality  ? 

"But  I  waive  these  objections  here,  for  I  wish  to  save  time 
and  to  come  back  to  a  very  serious  difficulty  touching  the 
song  discussed  above.  I  mentioned  it  a  few  moments  ago, 
but  deferred  its  discussion.  I  am  now  ready  to  take  it  up 
again.  Admitting  that  I  can,  following  a  general  rule,  keep 
on  adding  one  unit,  I  cannot  see  that  all  this  has  any  bearing 
whatever  on  the  problem  how  I  can  begin  with  a  song  and 
develop  out  of  its  inner  purpose  any  such  variety  of  content 
as  Abraham,  Anthracite  Coal,  the  Andes,  Ararat,  and  all  the 
other  objects  which  I  seem  compelled  to  look  up  in  an  ency- 
clopedia, if  I  am  to  know  them  at  all.  Is  there  any  procedure 
known  to  science  by  which  the  most  complicated  of  musical 
compositions  may  be  made  to  spawn  in  this  way  ?  If  there  is, 
I  have  never  heard  of  it." 

"Wait,"  is  the  answer,  "we  are  not  yet  through  with  the 
mathematicians.  You  must  be  taugVt  to  know  yourself. 
Dedekind,  who  has  written  so  ingeniously  of  numbers,  made  a 
suggestion  which  finds  a  novel  and  fruitful  development  in 
your  Book  of  Instructions.^^  Just  consider  what  is  implied 
in  your  having  a  thought  of  any  kind.  For  instance,  you 
think,  'To-day  is  Tuesday  ' ;  and  you  resolve  to  reflect  upon 
this  thought.  It  follows  that,  in  virtue  of  your  one  plan  of 
reflecting  upon  this  thought,  there  ideally  clusters  about  the 


Another  World  of  the  New  Idealism         207 

thought  an  endless  system  of  thoughts  of  which  this  thought 
is  the  first.  The  series  runs  :  this  is  one  of  my  thoughts  ;  yes, 
and  this  last  reflection  is  one  of  my  thoughts  ;  and  so  on  with- 
out end.^^  The  system  is  known  to  be  infinite,  not  by  counting 
its  members,  but  by  virtue  of  the  universal  plan  that  each  of 
its  members  shall  be  followed  by  another.  The  whole  system 
is  given  at  once  by  the  definition  of  the  undertaking.^*  Such 
an  endless  system  is  an  ideally  completed  Self,  a  completely 
self-conscious  thought.^^  Thus  every  self  includes  an  infinite 
diversity  and  this  diversity  results  from  the  'undisturbed  ex- 
pression of  the  intellect's  internal  meanings.'  ^^ 

"I  beg  you  now  to  lay  hold  of  still  another  plank  thrown 
to  us  by  the  mathematicians.  Have  they  not  made  it  clear 
that,  when  we  are  speaking  of  infinites,  it  is  not  true  that  the 
whole  is  greater  than  the  part?^^  Each  self,  however  partial 
it  may  be,  is  '  infinite  in  its  own  kind,'  ^^  and  need  not  be  con- 
ceived to  be  in  any  sense  less  complicated  than  is  the  Universe, 
or  Absolute.^^  It  may  be  conceived  as  a  Part  equal  to  the 
Whole,  and  finally  united,  as  such  equal,  to  the  whole  wherein 
it  dwells.'*'^  Would  not  a  perfect  map  of  England,  however 
small,  completely  represent  the  whole  of  England  ?  and 
would  not  its  degree  of  complication  be  the  same  ?  ^^ 

"Now  we  are  ready  for  a  higher  flight,  which  will  reveal  to 
us  the  multiplicity  of  concrete  and  varied  contents  that  seem 
to  give  you  trouble.  Nothing  exists  independently  of  any- 
thing else;  hence,  'knowledge,  in  facing  reaHty  at  all,  faces 
in  some  wise  the  whole  of  it  at  once,  and  the  only  question  is 
how  this  at  any  instant  takes  place.' ^^  You  can,  for  example, 
think  now  of  Asia,  and  you  seem  to  yourself  to  be  thinking  of 
nothing  else.  But  Asia  has  Being,  and  the  rest  of  the  world 
has  Being,  too.  All  the  objects  other  than  Asia  cannot  be 
wholly  other  than  Asia,  or  they  would  have  no  Being.  It  is 
clear,  then,  that  in  knowing  Asia  you  in  some  sense  know 
all    other    objects.     'Whoever    knows    any    concrete    object, 


2o8  The   World  We  Live  In 

knows  in  a  sense  all  objects.     In  what  sense  is  he,  then,  ignorant 

of  any? '^3 

"The  answer  to  this  important  question  is  simple  :  what  we 
now  concretely  know  is  related  to  what  we  do  not  now  con- 
cretely know  as  '  the  objects  which  our  attention  focuses  are 
related  to  what,  although  present,  is  lost  in  the  background  of 
consciousness.  Ignorance  always  means  inattention  to  details  J  ^ 
'  Our  finitude  means,  then,  an  actual  inattention,  —  a  lack  of 
successful  interest,  at  this  conscious  instant,  in  more  than  a  very 
few  of  the  details  of  the  universe.  But  the  infinitely  mumerous 
other  details  are  in  no  wise  wholly  absent  from  our  knowledge, 
even  now.''  ^^  Any  one  of  them  could  now  be  known,  if  only  we 
were  able  to  attend  to  its  actual  presence.^^  But  'a  certain 
attitude  of  will,  just  now  unchangeable  by  us,  has  determined 
each  of  us  to  a  present  stubborn  inattention  to  the  vast  totality 
which  we  just  called  in  our  discussion  the  rest  of  the  world.' 
'The  inattention  in  question  hides  from  us  not  only  the  par- 
ticular facts  themselves,  but  the  reflective  knowledge  of  what 
it  is  that  we  ourselves  will.'  ^^ 

"Thus,  you  see  that,  in  knowing  that  song  and  in  willing 
to  sing  it,  you  do,  indeed,  accomplish  vastly  more  than  you 
have  been  accustomed  to  suppose.  Your  true  internal  mean- 
ing embraces  all  Being.  In  knowing  the  song  you  know  all  — 
from  the  song  you  inevitably  pass  to  the  Unhmited  Universe 
or  God.  The  one  seemingly  trivial  internal  meaning  defines 
and  gives  at  one  stroke,  as  should  now  be  clear  to  you,  all  that 
is,  has  been,  and  shall  be  —  the  Object,  which  appeared  to  be, 
but  really  is  not,  external.  Hence,  if  you  can  sing  a  song, 
God  exists,  and  ..." 

But  the  boldness  of  the  flight  has  taken  away  the  breath  of 
one  accustomed  to  walking  with  pains  and  labor  on  the  rough 
crust  of  Everybody's  World.  The  listener  is  bewildered; 
he  has  lost  his  bearings.  It  seems  plain  that,  if  he  is,  indeed, 
omniscient,  his  stubborn  inattention  must  be  quite  all  that  it  is 


Aytother  World  of  the  New  Idealism         209 

accused  of  being ;  for,  although  he  is  aware  that  he  flapped  his 
wings  with  the  utmost  energy,  he  cannot  feel  sure  that  he 
moved  forward  at  all.  He  will  take  the  Book  of  Instructions, 
will  follow  its  directions  implicitly,  and  will  essay  the  flight 
himself.  Afterwards  he  will  discuss  the  route  with  his  guide, 
and  will  attempt  to  determine  definitely  the  exact  spot  upon 
which  he  touches  ground  again  when  he  descends  from  the 
upper  air. 

In  the  second  interview  with  his  mentor  he  shows  himself 
disappointed,  but  no  longer  bewildered  or  in  doubt.  "I 
took  the  Book  in  my  hand,"  he  declares,  "and  following 
minutely  the  instructions  there  set  forth,  I  sailed  repeatedly 
over  the  course  indicated.  I  am  now  confident  that  I  never 
really  moved  at  all.  Six  several  times  I  found  myself,  at  the 
end  of  my  exertions,  in  precisely  the  place  from  which  I  made 
my  ascent,  and  I  see  that  I  might  have  gotten  on  quite  as  well 
without  making  any  effort  at  all. 

"The  journey  is  a  dialectical  illusion,  and  is  a  very  skillful 
contrivance.  The  problem  was  to  set  out  from  a  mere  song 
and  to  end  with  God.  To  get  so  much  out  of  so  little  seemed 
impossible,  and  the  method  appeared  to  have  no  connection 
with  the  well-tried  methods  by  which  human  knowledge 
actually  increases.  And,  indeed,  the  task  is  an  impossible 
one ;  but  please  observe  that  this  task  is  not  even  attempted. 
The  author  does  not  really  start  with  the  internal  meaning  of 
a  song  and  expand  it  into  an  infinite  imi verse.  What  he  does 
is  far  different. 

"Recall  to  mind  that  you  asked  me  to  sing  a  song,  and  then 
pointed  out  to  me  that  I  had  purposed  to  sing  that  song,  a 
song  composed  by  Beethoven,  a  particular  man,  belonging  to  a 
particular  time  and  place,  and  thus  assigned  his  niche  in  this 
particular  system  of  things  and  no  other.  You  did  not,  in 
other  words,  extract  Beethoven  or  anything  else  from  that 
'  song^  but  from  'that  song.'     The  difference  is  world  wide. 


2IO  The   World  We  Live  In 

^That  song,'  with  the  emphasis  upon  the  'that,'  means,  as  the 
Book  would  express  it,  the  song  'rendered  determinate'  or 
'completely  embodied.'  Now,  'that  song  embodied'  is  a  mere 
euphemism  for  '  the  infinite  universe  of  things  with  that 
song  in  it.' 

"The  former  expression  is  more  easy  to  misconceive  than 
is  the  latter;  and,  if  we  omit  the  word  'embodied'  and  say 
briefly  'that  song,'  it  is  still  easier  to  fall  into  misconception. 
What  more  natural  than  to  suppose  that  one  is  talking  about 
the  song  and  not  about  the  Universe?  The  expression 
deceived  me  for  a  time,  and  I  actually  supposed  that,  by  some 
exercise  of  ingenuity,  the  World  or  God  was  to  be  extracted 
from  a  song. 

"What  the  dialectical  argument  actually  amounts  to  is  this  : 
Given  that  song  in  its  place  in  an  Infinite  Universe,  then  we 
may  be  assured  that  there  is  an  Infinite  Universe  ^vith  that 
song  in  it.  To  this  statement  I  should  not  for  a  moment 
demur;  but  it  seems  to  me  that  I  have  been  compelled  to 
make  a  feint  of  traveling  a  prodigious  distance  in  order  to 
find  myself  just  where  I  was  standing  at  the  outset. 

"And  I  am  con\dnced  that  the  learned  and  ingenious  author 
of  the  Book  has  unwittingly  deceived  himself  as  he  deceived 
me.  It  is  a  very  striking  circumstance  that,  in  the  Seventh 
Lecture  of  the  First  Volume,  we  find  a  number  of  references 
to  the  inductive  process  by  which,  as  has  long  been  knowTi  in 
Everybody's  World,  we  attain  to  a  knowledge  that  any  song 
is  that  song  —  in  other  words,  to  the  knowledge  that  there  is  a 
Universe  at  all.  To  be  sure,  this  inductive  process  is  given 
but  a  half-hearted  recognition.  Although  the  distinction  is 
made  between  'internal  experience'  and  'external  experience,' 
the  latter  is  treated  as  in  some  sense  an  impostor.  It  is  termed: 
'what  is  usually  called  external  experience' ;  ^  'what  is  called 
external  experience';''^  'so-called  external  experience.' ^"^ 
Nevertheless,  while,  in  the  first  part  of  the  Seventh  Lecture, 


A7iother   War  Id  of  the  New  Idealism         211 

the  effort  is  made  to  prove  that  much  may  be  known  by  having 
recourse  to  internal  meanings  alone,  it  is  expressly  admitted 
that  external  experience  'furnishes  a  positive  content  which 
our  human  internal  meanings  can  never  construct  for  them- 
selves.' ^^ 

"But  in  the  second  half  of  the  same  Lecture  the  significance 
of  observation  and  induction  is  driven  back  by  the  growing 
impetus  of  the  notion  that  no  idea  can  have  any  object  except 
in  so  far  as  it  selects  it  for  itself.  The  conclusion  is  drawn 
that  the  object  of  an  idea  'can  have  no  essential  character 
which  is  not  predetennined  by  the  purpose,  the  internal 
meaning,  the  conscious  intent,  of  that  idea  itself.'  ^"  That  is 
to  say,  the  World  is,  after  all,  to  be  extracted  from  the  'internal 
meaning'  of  the  idea.  That  it  is,  in  fact,  extracted  from  the 
idea  as  'embodied,'  i.e.  from  the  World,  is  not  clear  to  the 
author's  mind.^^  Were  it  clear,  he  would  have  to  ask  himself : 
By  what  process  does  any  man  learn  that  there  is  a  Universe 
from  which  we  may  tautologically  infer  the  Universe  ? 

"Instead  of  seriously  raising  this  question  and  answering 
it  in  the  spirit  of  the  science  of  logic,  he  has  recourse  to  an 
assumption  paralyzing  to  the  plain  man  and  to  the  man  of 
science,  to  wit,  to  the  assumption  that  Everybody  is  omnis- 
cient, but  is  inattentive  —  that  Everybody  knows  and  wills,  at 
every  instant,  the  whole  Universe,  but  stubbornly  determines 
not  to  be  interested  in  its  details.^^  An  uneasy  consciousness 
that  all  is  not  quite  right  with  this  extraction  of  the  W^orld 
from  every  finite  idea  expresses  itself  in  a  concession  not  easy 
to  reconcile  with  the  course  of  the  argument :  '  Of  course,  my 
private  will,  when  viewed  as  a  mere  force  in  nature,  does  not 
create  the  rest  of  nature.  But  my  conscious  will  as  expressed 
in  my  ideas  does  logically  determine  what  objects  are  my 
objects.' ^^ 

"The  author  does  not,  then,  see  clearly  that  he  is  simply 
assuming  the  Universe  and  then  inferring  from  it  the  Universe. 


212  The   World  We  Live  In 

He  fancies  that  he  is  compelled  so  to  stretch  the  'purpose' 
of  a  song  as  to  bring  within  its  circuit  all  there  is.  And  to 
this  end  he  invokes  the  mathematician. 

"The  mathematician  can  do  some  things  admirably.  To 
those  who  are  not  mathematicians,  it  seems  astonishing  how 
much  he  can  deduce  apparently  from  a  few  definitions.  There 
is,  to  be  sure,  still  some  dispute  as  to  what  is  the  whole  ground 
from  which  he  reasons,  and  as  to  the  real  significance  of  his 
results.  Of  the  usefulness  of  his  work,  and  of  the  exactitude 
of  his  processes  as  compared  with  what  seems  attainable  in 
certain  other  fields,  there  can  be  no  question. 

"Nevertheless,  there  are  things  which  the  mathematician, 
as  such,  should  not  be  called  upon  to  do.  He  may,  not  as 
mathematician,  but  as  man,  carry  the  time  at  a  reHgious  meet- 
ing. But  neither  as  mathematician  nor  as  man  can  he  extract 
from  that  tune,  by  any  iterative  process,^^  the  children  of 
Israel  or  a  map  of  the  other  side  of  the  moon.  He  appears, 
it  is  true,  in  his  professional  capacity,  to  be  able  to  start  with 
little  and  to  end  with  much.  Yet  the  mathematician's  'much' 
is  in  no  case  a  'much'  of  the  sort  in  question.  He  is  an  irrele- 
vant witness  and  may  be  ruled  out  of  the  court. 

"Nor  is  he  of  the  least  help  in  proving  that  each  self  is 
infinitely  complicated,  and  may  implicitly  contain  an  infinity 
of  ideas,  thus  representing  a  boundless  Universe  as  an  ideally 
perfect  map  of  England  might  represent  England. 

"Let  us  grant  him,  for  the  sake  of  argument,  that,  if  we 
have  an  idea,  we  may  reflect  that  we  can  have  an  idea  of  that 
idea,  and  so  on  without  end.  What  does  such  an  infinity 
amount  to  ?  Let  the  idea  in  question  be  the  idea  of  a  cat. 
Can  the  countless  repetitions  indicated  in  any  wise  prove  that 
he  who  has  the  idea  has  in  his  mind  anything  save  the  idea  of 
a  cat  ?  The  doubtful  infinity  accorded  him  is,  so  to  speak,  a 
vertical  one.  It  is  valued  by  no  man,  and  is  never  supposed  to 
indicate  broad  information. 


Another  World  of  the  New  Idealism         213 

"If  the  mathematician  is  really  to  help  me,  let  him  show 
me  how,  from  the  idea  of  a  cat,  I  can  pass  to  that  of  a  dog, 
from  that  to  the  ideas  of  all  the  animals  in  Africa,  and  can  thus 
continue,  developing  a  horizontal  infinity,  which  fairly  repre- 
sents the  complicated  structure  of  the  Universe. 

"The  assumption  of  human  omniscience  and  invincible 
inattention  is  plainly  an  assumption  and  nothing  more.  It 
is  an  assumption  denied  by  our  whole  experience  of  men  and 
of  things.  That  it  is  made  can  only  mean  that  the  author 
does  not  see  how,  without  assuming  the  unlimited  Universe,  he 
can  demonstrate  that  there  is  an  imlimited  Universe,^^  and 
can  develop  its  contents  deductively.  He  conceives  that  the 
Universe  is  in  every  passing  moment;  and  yet,  manifestly, 
it  is  not  precisely  in  every  passing  moment,  but  must  be 
developed  out  of  it  by  dialectic.  It  is  for  aid  in  showing  that 
it  is  not  incredible  that  the  infinite  should  be  developed  deduc- 
tively from  the  fragmentary  and  the  finite  that  the  author  is 
driven  to  consort  with  the  mathematician.  As  we  have  seen, 
the  mathematician  is  an  irrelevant  witness. 

"Let  us  leave  these  mismiderstandings  and  come  back  to 
the  real  argument.  So  far  as  I  can  see,  it  amounts  only  to  this  : 
Given  this  song  in  an  Infinite  and  Only  Universe,  then  we  maybe 
assured  that  there  is  an  Infinite  and  Only  Universe.  The  further 
statement  that  the  Universe  is  to  be  conceived  as  Thought  and 
WiU  rests,  of  course,  upon  the  ideahstic  assumption  that 
everything  that  is  must  be  consciously  known  by  some  one.^^ 
To  some  very  acute  minds  this  has  appeared  self-evident.'^^ 
Nevertheless,  the  assumption  is  combated  by  the  Realist, 
who  complains  here  of  a  confusion  of  subjective  and  objective, 
which,  he  claims,  can  very  well  be  avoided,  if  one  will  not  set 
up  a  Realism  of  straw,  and  then  proceed  to  demolish  it. 

"I  cannot,  hence,  admit  that  reflection  upon  the  'internal' 
and  the  'external'  meaning  of  ideas  guarantees  the  existence 
of  God  at  all.     But  such  is  my  eagerness  to  get  a  good  view  of 


2  14  ^^^^'   ^orld  We  Live  In 

the  whole  doctrine,  that  I  beg  you  to  forget  that  I  have  been 
compelled  to  withhold  my  assent  so  far.  Let  us  assume  that 
we  have  gotten  a  Universe,  that  is  to  be  conceived  as  Thought 
and  Will,  and  that  it  may  properly  be  called  God.  Show  me, 
I  beg,  more  in  detail,  how  this  Universe  is  to  be  conceived,  and 
point  out  the  comfort  and  consolation  that  are  to  be  had  in 
its  contemplation." 

It  is  a  good  deal  to  ask,  for  no  great  results  can  reasonably  be 
hoped  for  in  the  case  of  one  who  seems  constitutionally  unfitted 
for  dialectic  flights.  How  can  he  who  has  failed  to  assure 
himself  of  the  existence  of  God,  by  grasping  the  significance 
of  "internal"  and  "external"  meanings,  expect  to  reach  by  a 
similar  path  the  comforting  truths  of  himian  Freedom  and 
Immortality  ?  Nevertheless,  the  guide  is  induced  to  continue 
the  exposition,  though  the  continuation  is  reserved  for  another 
interview. 


CHAPTER  XV 


THE   GLORY   OF   IT 


We  all  accept  a  World  of  some  kind,  even  those  of  us  who 
are  by  no  means  clear  touching  the  vahdity  of  our  title  to  it. 
Who  can  blame  us  for  hoping  that  it  may  turn  out  to  be  a 
good  sort  of  a  world  in  the  end  ?  But  those  who  have  reflected 
upon  the  lessons  to  be  learned  from  the  history  of  philosophy 
are  aware,  as  was  Pepys,  that  disappointment  may  follow  on 
the  heels  of  "overexpectation."  He  who  has  watched  ^vith  a 
pang  the  sunset  splendors  of  Berkeley's  World  as  Idea  fade  into 
the  ashen  hues  of  common,  if  real,  cloud,  distrusts  the  shining 
vision  that  appears  in  the  west  two  centuries  later.  Or,  if 
distrust  is  too  strong  an  expression,  let  us  say  that  his  attitude 
toward  it  is  characterized  by  caution.  Wlien  a  prospectus 
promises  great  tilings,  he  who  has  money  to  invest  begins  to 
look  narrowly  into  the  question  of  security. 

The  new  lesson  commences,  as  it  should,  in  the  contempla- 
tion of  Nature.  "If  we  are  to  understand  what  we  mean  by 
Material  Nature,"  says  the  guide,  "and  why  we  believe  it  to 
be  real,  we  must  ask :  '  What  internal  meaning  of  ours  seeks 
an  embodiment  such  that,  to  our  minds,  only  outer  Nature 
can  furnish  this  embodiment  ?  '  ^  Now,  our  belief  in  the  material 
world  is  inseparably  bound  up  with  our  belief  in  the  existence 
of  our  fellow- men.  Nature  is  a  realm  known  to  or  knowable 
by  various  men.^  The  popular  error  which  assumes  that  we 
directly  know  men's  bodies,  and  only  indirectly,  and  by  an 
interpretation  of  their  words,  actions,  and  expressions,  know 
that  men  have  minds  and  what  their  minds  are  like,  must 

215 


2i6  The   World  We  Live  In 

be  abandoned.^  We  know  that  our  fellows  are  real  and  have 
an  inner  life  of  their  own,  because  they  furnish  us  with  more 
ideas  —  they  help  us  to  our  complete  embodiment,  our  '  full 
meaning,'  our  'hidden  Reality.'^ 

"It  is,  thus,  the  spread  of  the  'internal  meaning'  —  to 
which  you  demur  —  that  furnishes  us  both  with  our  fellow- 
men  and  with  an  external  world.  That  the  latter  is  dependent 
on  the  former  is  clear  from  the  following  considerations : 
Take  such  an  object  as  the  Sun.  We  think  of  it  as  external, 
as  independent.  What  does  this  mean  ?  It  means  that  other 
men  see  the  sun  when  I  do  not,  'hence,  its  existence  goes  wholly 
beyond  that  of  my  private  consciousness,  and  persists  in  my 
absence.'  While  I  sleep,  men  in  other  lands  see  the  sun,  as 
social  communication  teaches  me.  I  learn  by  common  report 
that  it  shone  before  I  was  born.  I  come  to  believe  that  it  will 
shine  for  future  generations.  It  is,  thus,  something  inde- 
pendent of  each,  but  verifiable  by  each."  And  physical  nature 
as  a  whole  is  a  name  for  a  collection  of  }ust  such  objects  —  for 
the  series  of  objects  that  men  have  been  able  '  to  agree  upon 
as  the  common  basis  of  definite  acts  of  cooperation.'  It  is  a 
conventional  something,  a  socially  significant  tool,  taken  up 
for  the  purpose  of  mutual  communication."  ^ 

The  physical  world,  as  it  seems,  then,  enjoys  an  essentially 
Berkeleyan  existence  in  the  New  Idealism,  as  in  the  Old.  Its 
being  is  bolstered  up  by  the  concurrence  of  Minds.  What 
more  natural  than  that  it  should  again  present  itself  as  our 
slave  and  not  as  our  master  ?  It  is  pointed  out  that  we  should 
not  regard  Nature  as  fundamentally  mechanical,  or  its  laws 
as  absolutely  unvarying.^  Are  not  the  "seemingly  unvarying 
laws  of  nature"  something  agreed  upon  for  mutual  conven- 
ience ?  ^  It  is  indicated  that  we  must  not  take  too  seriously 
the  contrast  between  matter  and  mind ;  nor,  for  that  matter, 
the  sciences  which  occupy  themselves  mth  the  physical. 
Have  the  special  sciences  a  right  to  pretend  to  reveal  to  us  the 


The  Glory  of  It  217 

ultimate  truth  about  the  nature  of  things?  Is  the  contrast 
between  mind  and  matter  ultimate  ?  ^ 

"Our  internal  meanings,"  continues  the  guide,  "possess  a 
reference  to  a  realm  beyond  themselves,  within  which  we 
men  find  our  place.  Out  of  this  realm  we  have  come.  Into 
it,  at  death,  we  seem  to  go.  This  realm  is  Nature. '°  But  what 
is  Nature?  There  undoubtedly  is  an  apparently  material 
world,  and  we  are  aware  of  a  'more  or  less  regular  routine'  of 
phenomena.^^  Nevertheless,  evolution  bridges  the  chasm 
between  what  we  call '  dead  matter '  and  that  wliich  indubitably 
shows  signs  of  mind.  They  are  at  heart  ahke.^^  All  nature  is 
alive.  Our  experience  of  nature  is  but  a  hint  of  a  vaster  realm 
of  life  and  meaning  of  which  we  are  a  part,  and  of  which  the 
final  unity  is  God.^^ 

"Thus,  the  contrast  between  material  and  mental  depends 
upon  the  accidents  of  our  human  point  of  view.^^  In  nature 
in  general  we  have  signs  of  a  vast  realm  of  finite  consciousness. 
All  is  fluent,  all  seeks  ideals.^°  For  us  the  important  question 
is :  How  are  we  to  conceive  the  relation  between  our  Httle 
selves  and  the  great  Whole  to  which  they  belong  ?  To  this 
problem  let  us  address  ourselves. 

"At  this  point  I  am  compelled  to  enter  into  an  abstruse 
matter,  but  one  of  the  utmost  importance  to  our  doctrine. 
This  is  our  most  dizzying  flight,  and  what  follows  will  be  easy 
and  reassuring.     Be  prepared  to  mount. 

"Our  idealistic  concept  of  Being  imphes,  as  you  have  seen, 
that  'whatever  is,  is  consciously  known  as  the  fulfillment  of 
some  idea,  and  is  so  known  either  by  ourselves  at  this  moment, 
or  by  a  consciousness  inclusive  of  our  own.'^^  It  has  been  made 
clear  that  our  present  consciousness  is  but  a  fragment  of  our 
whole  meaning  —  in  us  the  '  internal '  has  not  as  yet  absorbed 
the  'external.'  It  follows  at  once  that  the  whole  world  of 
truth  and  being  must  exist  only  as  present,  in  all  its  variety, 
its  wealth,  its  relationships,  its  entire  constitution,  to  the  unity 


2i8  The   World  We  Live  In 

of  a  single  consciousness,  which  includes  both  our  own  and  all 
finite  conscious  meanings  in  one  final  eternally  present  insight.^^ 
The  significance  of  this  I  develop  at  length  : 

''Every  one  must  admit  that  we  are  conscious  of  change^ 
that  is,  of  a  succession  of  events.  Together,  the  events  con- 
stitute a  temporal  order.  Each  event  is  over  and  past  when 
the  next  one  appears  on  the  scene.  This  we  may  call  the 
successive  aspect  of  the  temporal  order.^^ 

"On  the  other  hand,  who  could  be  conscious  of  a  succession 
of  events,  unless  at  least  two  of  the  events  were  given  in  con- 
sciousness together  ?  ^^  The  sense  in  which  the  one  event  is 
over  and  gone  when  the  other  comes  is  not  the  sense  in  vv'hich 
both  events  are  experienced  together.  WTien  we  reflect  upon 
this  experiencing  of  the  events  together,  we  have  to  do  with  a 
second  aspect  of  time.  We  may,  if  we  choose,  when  considering 
this  aspect,  say  that  both  events  are  present  'at  once  J  ^° 

"It  is  most  important  not  to  misconceive  this.  All  that  it 
means  is  that  our  consciousness  is  characterized  by  what  has 
been  called  a  'time-span.'  The  word  'present'  has  two  quite 
distinct  senses,  which  should  never  be  confused  with  each 
other.  When  we  say  the  two  events  are  'present  at  once,' 
we  do  not  mean,  and  must  not  mean,  that  they  have  their 
being  in  the  same  moment  of  time.  The  one  is  always  past 
and  gone  when  the  other  is  here.  This  is  a  matter  of  funda- 
mental importance  for  our  conception  of  time  and  of  eternity .^^ 

"Now,  we  may  know  time  by  'direct  experience,'  or  we  may 
have  of  it  a  'relatively  indirect  conception.'--  We  directly 
perceive  change  only  as  a  very  brief  span ;  but  we  may  think 
of  all  the  changes  that  have  taken  place  during  a  given  minute, 
hour,  day,  year,  or  century.  No  one  hesitates  to  say  'the 
present  year'  or  '  the  present  century.'  The  'specious present' 
thus  indicated  is  never,  of  course,  directly  included  in  our 
'time-span,'  which  is  far  too  brief  for  this.  We  'think  of 
these  times,  as  I  may  'think  of  the  State  of  Massachusetts, 


The  Glory  of  It  219 

although  a  very  little  bit  of  it  can  be  embraced  directly  by  my 
present  field  of  vision. 

"Suppose,  however,  that  some  Being  enjoyed  a  far  greater 
'time-span'  than  we  do.  Would  not  such  divisions  of  time  be 
perceived  by  it  'at  once'  ?  To  be  sure,  any  such  division  of 
time  is  time^  and  the  events  which  take  place  in  it  are  all  of 
them  successive;  some  of  them  no  longer  exist,  while  others 
do  not  yet  exist.  Do  not  forget  that  the  'at  once'  above 
employed  does  not  indicate  that  any  two  of  the  events  in 
question  exist  at  the  same  time.  It  has  a  quite  unique  sig- 
nificance which,  as  I  have  warned  you,  must  not  be  confused 
with  any  other.^  In  the  usual  temporal  sense  of  the  words 
'at  once,'  two  events,  such  as  the  tick  of  a  clock  and  the  fall 
of  a  shutter,  may  occur  'at  once,'  or  'be  present  together.' 
This  is  ob\dously  a  very  different  matter.  It  means  that  the 
events  in  question  are  simultaneous. 

"With  this  we  are  ready  for  a  contemplation  of  the  contrast 
between  the  Temporal  and  the  Eternal,  with  all  that  it  implies. 
According  to  our  Idealism,  we  men  must  view  the  whole 
World-life  as  a  temporal  order.  There  is  no  last  moment  in 
the  evolution  of  things.  All  events  belong  to  the  series  which 
is  characterized  by  a  'no  longer'  and  a  'not  yet.'^^  But  the 
Absolute,  the  Universe,  God,  enjoys  a  'time-span'  which  is 
infinite.  God  is  not  shut  up  to  an  indirect  knowledge  of  great 
stretches  of  time,  as  we  men  are.  To  Him,  everything  is 
present  'at  once,'  in  the  pecuHar  sense  of  the  expression  that 
has  been  made  clear  above.  This  is  the  totum  simul  regarding 
which  men  discoursed  in  the  Middle  Ages  —  this  is  Eternity, 
as  contrasted  %\dth  Time.^^ 

"Thus,  all  the  events  which  make  up  the  World-Hfe  are  in  a 
Temporal  Order.  Nevertheless,  since  the  totahty  of  temporal 
events  can  have  no  events  preceding  or  succeeding  it,  but  is 
'present  at  once'  to  the  'time-span'  of  the  Absolute,  we  may 
also  say  that  all  the  events  that  make  up  the  World-life  stand 


2  20  The   World  We  Live  In 

in  an  Eternal  Order.  The  Eternal  Consciousness  is  not  in 
time;  the  complete  series  of  temporal  happenings  may  be 
regarded  as  an  Individual  Whole,  and,  thus,  as  eternal.-^ 
The  whole  of  time  contains  'a  single  expression  of  the  divine 
Will'  and  hence,  'despite  its  endlessness,'  the  time-world  is 
'present'  as  a  single  whole  to  the  Absolute,  'whose  Will  this 
is,  and  whose  Ufe  all  this  sequence  embodies.'  -' 

"At  last  we  have  attained  the  desired  height,  and  may 
descend  at  our  ease  to  reap  the  fruits  of  our  exertions.  The 
Promised  Land  lies  before  us.  The  glory  of  it  is  not  to  be 
hidden.  God's  will  is  eternally  accompHshed.  ]Man  is  free. 
God  knows  man's  sufferings  and  disappointments,  and  makes 
good  his  deficiencies.  In  spite  of  his  apparent  finitude  and 
failure,  man  may  be  assured  that  his  true  will,  which  is  God's 
will,  is  not  left  unsatisfied.  Death  is  banished.  Immortality 
is  brought  to  light.  '  In  Eternity  all  is  done,  and  we,  too,  rest 
from  our  labors.'  ^^ 

"The  Freedom  of  man  need  not  long  detain  us,  for  it  can 
now  be  demonstrated  in  a  sentence  or  two.  Listen.  Causal 
explanation  never  has  to  do  with  what  is  individual  about 
events.-^  Every  finite  fact  is  a  positive  part  of  the  unique 
dixine  experience,  and  is,  therefore,  itself  unique.  Your  own 
present  will  is  a  stage  or  case  of  the  expression  of  the  divine 
purpose  at  a  given  point  of  time  ;  it,  too,  is  unique.^"  What- 
ever is  unique  is  not,  as  such,  causally  explicable.^^  If  you 
will  at  all,  it  is  evident  that  you  must  will  uniquely.  It  is,  then, 
you  who  just  here  are  God's  will,  or  who  just  here  consciously 
act  for  the  whole.  You  are  in  so  far  free.^^  Have  no  fear 
that  you  are  laid  in  bonds  by  God's  foreknowledge.  There 
can  be  no  foreknowledge  of  the  Unique. ^^ 

"And  now  for  Immortality.  Bear  in  mind  that  the  rational 
being  with  whom  you  deal,  when  you  observe  an  animal's 
dimmer  hints  of  rationality,  may  phenomenally  be  represented 
rather  by  the  race  as  a  whole  than  by  any  one  individual. 


The  Glory  of  It  221 

The  individual  animal  may  be  regarded  as  'a  temporally 
brief  section  of  a  person '  —  the  race  is  the  person,  with  a 
span  of  consciousness  far  longer  than  ours ;  it  is  the  sentence, 
the  individual  is  the  word  in  it.^^  In  some  such  way  must  we 
think  of  man.  As  individuals  we  are  differentiations  from — 
temporally  brief  sections  of  —  a  finite  conscious  experience  of 
presumably  a  much  longer  time-span  than  our  present  one. 
This  finite  consciousness  of  longer  time-span,  indicated  to  us 
in  the  phenomena  of  memory  and  of  race-instinct,  is  individu- 
ated, is  rational,  is  a  live  being,  and  is  continuous  in  some  sense 
with  our  own  individuality.^^  The  birth  or  death  of  an  indi- 
vidual man  may  mean  '  the  occurrence  of  something  interesting 
in  a  shorter  or  longer  time-span '  —  that  of  the  larger  inclusive 
consciousness.^'' 

"But  why  stop  with  the  race?  Why  not  go  on  to  the 
conclusion?  The  Self  of  the  'finite  internal  meaning,'  the 
temporal  and  fragmentary  Self  endowed  with  'our  present 
flickering  form  of  mortal  consciousness,'  dies  with  its  own 
moment.  Nevertheless,  the  Self  completely  embodied,  that 
is,  the  Self  which  is  identical  with  the  Universe,  or  God,  pos- 
sesses, in  the  Eternal  World,  'a  consciousness  far  transcending 
that  of  our  present  human  type  of  momentary  insight.'  'Our 
life,  as  hid  from  us  now,  in  the  life  of  God,  has  another  form 
of  consciousness  than  the  one  we  now  possess.' ^'^ 

"Physical  death  seems,  of  course,  to  be  an  undeniable 
fact.^^  Our  problem  is :  How  is  death  possible  at  all  as  a 
real  event  ?  We,  as  idealists,  have  a  solution.  To  be,  means 
to  fulfill  a  purpose.  Hence,  if  death  is  real,  it  is  real  only  as 
fulfilling  a  purpose.  But  what  purpose  can  be  fulfilled  by 
the  ending  of  a  hfe  whose  purpose  is  not  fulfilled?  The 
answer  is  at  once  forthcoming :  '  The  purpose  that  can  be 
fulfilled  by  the  ending  of  such  a  life  is  necessarily  a  purpose 
that,  in  the  eternal  world,  is  consciously  known  and  seen  as 
continuous  with,  yes,  as  inclusive  of,  the  very  purpose  whose 


2  22  The   World  We  Live  In 

fulfillment  the  temporal  death  seems  to  cut  short.' ^^  By  whom 
is  this  purpose  known  ?  It  is  known  by  some  being  who  can 
say :  'This  was  my  purpose,  but  temporarily  I  no  longer  seek 
its  embodiment.'  "^^  '  The  life  that  is  ended  is  thus  viewed  by 
the  Absolute  as  followed,  at  some  period  of  time,  by  another 
life  that  in  its  meaning  is  continuous  with  the  first.'  '^^  Thus, 
the  selective  process  in  Nature  is  a  process  invohdng  survival 
as  well  as  death."*- 

'"Not  otherwise,  in  our  IdeaUstic  World,  is  death  possible. 
I  can  temporally  die;  but  I  myself,  as  larger  individual,  in 
the  eternal  world,  see  'u;hy  I  die ;  and  thus,  in  essence,  my  whole 
individuaUty  is  continuous  in  true  meaning  with  the  indi\id- 
uality  that  dies.'^^  You  see,  true  Being  is  essentially  a  WTiole 
Individual  Fact,  which  does  not  send  you  beyond  itself,  and 
which  is,  therefore,  in  its  wholeness,  deathless.  Where  death 
is,  Being  in  its  Wholeness  is  not.''^  Do  I  make  my  meaning 
quite  plain?  Remember  that  the  true  Self  is  always  the 
Universe.  What  dies  is  the  fragmentary,  apparent,  flickering 
Self  of  common  experience.  The  Universe  cannot  die,  can  it  ? 
Then  man  is  immortal. 

"That  God's  Will  is  eternally  accomplished  scarcely  needs 
proof.  Does  not  the  Universe  exist,  and  is  not  the  fact  of 
its  existence  the  accompHshment  of  God's  Will?  That  God 
knows  our  sorrows  and  shortcomings  is  self-evident.  Must 
not  everything  that  is,  be  known?  And,  since  our  true  will 
is  our  will  Completely  Embodied,  or,  in  other  words,  the 
Universe,  is  not  our  true  will,  which  is  God's  Will,  also  accom- 
plished ?  'Arise,  then,  freeman,  stand  forth  in  thy  world. 
It  is  God's  world.  It  is  also  thine.'  ^^  I  give  you  time  to  reflect 
upon  this  doctrine.  Behold  before  you  the  World  of  the  New 
Idealism.     Is  not  the  \ision  inspiring  ?  " 

"I  do  not  need  tim.e  to  reflect,"  is  the  answer.  "I  have  read 
the  Book ;  I  have  listened ;  and  I  have  reflected  while  you 
spoke.     More  than  ever  am  I  con\inced  that  your  dialectic 


The  Glory  of  It  223 

flight  is  only  a  seeming  flight  ^  that  you  have  conjured  up  a 
mist  of  words,  and  have  stood  still.  Let  me  sum  up  in  plain 
language  all  that  you  have  pointed  out  to  me. 

"You  have  shown  me  that,  given  a  song  in  its  particular 
place  in  an  Infinite  Universe,  we  may  be  assured  that  there  is 
an  Infinite  Universe  with  a  song  in  it.  This  Universe  you  have 
called  God. 

"You  have  told  me  that  I  am  Free,  because  every  individual 
thing  in  the  Universe,  as  being  that  individual  thing  and 
nothing  else,  must  be  free.  I  share,  then,  it  seems,  my  freedom 
with  every  rotting  apple,  which  is  always  some  particular 
apple,  and  with  every  writhing  worm,  wliich  is  always  just 
this  and  no  other  worm.  Upon  such  freedom  I  can  set  no 
particular  value. 

"You  have  informed  me  that,  when  I  die,  the  Universe 
will  not  die,  but  that  other  Hfe  will  succeed  the  conscious  fife 
that  I  enjoy.  This  I  never  doubted  ;  but  this  is  not  what  men 
mean  by  immortahty.  Nor  does  it  make  my  mortality  the 
less  mortal  to  say  that  God  knows  my  life,  and  my  death,  with 
whatever  may  succeed  that,  for  me,  melancholy  event.  Keep 
clearly  in  mind  what  God's  knowledge  amounts  to. 

"Have  you  not  yourself  warned  me  against  confusing  the 
two  senses  of  the  expressions  '  together '  and  '  at  once '  ?  Have 
you  not  told  me  that  the  'time-span'  in  no  wise  interferes 
with  the  successive  character  of  events  in  time?  What  has 
been,  has  been,  to  God  and  to  man.  What  will  be,  will  be,  to 
God  and  to  man.  The  'eternity'  you  dwell  upon  does  not 
imply  that  the  'no  longer'  and  the  'not  yet'  of  the  world  are 
abolished.  It  means  only  that  the  one  'time-span'  stretches 
over  both,  just  as  my  own  'time-span'  includes  two  instants 
which  are,  nevertheless,  successive,  and  one  of  which  is  gone 
when  the  other  comes.  We  really  should  not  say,  then,  that 
God  sees  all  'at  one  glance,' ^^  for  that  is  misleading.  The 
expression  suggests  simultaneity. 


2  24  The  World  We  Live  In 

"No,  according  to  your  own  doctrine,  God  knows  the  events 
which  happen  in  the  world,  when  they  take  place,  and  at  no 
other  time.  He  is  constituted  by  the  complexity  of  lesser 
consciousnesses  that  make  up  the  world,  and  has  no  existence 
separate  from  these.'*"  The  divine  act  whereby  He  wills  you, 
the  individual,  *  is  identical  with  your  own  individual  will,  and 
exists  not  except  as  thus  identical.' ^^  'God  does  not  tem- 
porally foreloiow  anything,  excepting  in  so  far  as  He  is 
expressed  in  us  finite  beings.  The  knowledge  that  exists  in 
time  is  the  knowledge  that  finite  Selves  possess,  in  so  far  as 
they  are  finite.'  ^^ 

"In  the  'eternal'  knowledge  attributed  to  God,  it  is  not 
implied  that  God  knows  at  all  times  the  individual  happen- 
ings which  constitute  the  Universe.  By  this  'eternal'  knowl- 
edge, it  seems,  things  '  are  known  as  occurring  like  the  chords 
in  the  musical  succession,  precisely  when  and  how  they 
actually  occur.'  ^°  Thus,  God  knows  my  sorrows,  in  that  I 
know  them,  and  when  I  know  them.  He  will  know  the  'sec- 
tion' of  consciousness  that  is  to  succeed  my  mortal  self,  in 
that  that  'section'  will  know  itself.  That  every  'section' 
is  supposed  to  have  its  place  in  a  'time-span'  that  covers  the 
whole  past,  present,  and  future  does  not  make  the  mortality 
of  the  individual  'section'  the  less  mortal  in  any  sense  that 
interests  mankind.  Besides,  why  say  God  'eternally  knows'  ? 
Does  not  His  'time-span'  cover  past,  present,  and  future 
indifferently  ?  Is  it  not  as  just  to  say :  God  knew  ?  or, 
God  will  know  ?     Why  give  the  preference  to  the  present  ? 

"I,  then,  am  mortal  —  the  I  of  which  I  am  conscious,  and 
in  which  my  neighbors  are  interested.  It  is  these  our  mortal 
flickering  selves  that  are  born,  that  marry  and  are  given  in 
marriage,  that  fall  ill  and  call  in  the  physician,  that  shrink 
from  dissolution,  that  feel  that  their  purposes  are  cut  short  by 
untimely  death.  To  tell  one  of  them  that  he  really  is  identical 
with  the  Universe,  if  he  only  knew  it,  and  that,  hence,  he  cannot 


The  Glory  of  It  225 

die,  is  to  make  a  mock  of  his  terrors.  He  knows  that  the 
Universe  will  not  die,  and  he  fears  that  he  will.  Only  by  care- 
fully concealing  the  unpalatable  bolus  of  the  truth  one  wishes 
to  communicate  under  the  bland  sirups  of  an  elaborate 
diction  sweetened  by  comforting,  if  misleading,  associations, 
can  the  sufferer  be  induced  to  swallow  it  and  to  look  relieved. 

"On  the  accomplishment  of  God's  Will  and  of  our  wills  I 
need  not  dwell.  The  dialectic  has  not  really  transported  me 
to  a  new  world,  where  God,  Freedom,  and  Immortality  stand 
revealed.  Our  whole  journey  has  been  an  illusion.  On  the 
other  hand,  although  I  have  not  moved  forward,  I  am,  in  a 
sense,  not  precisely  where  I  was  to  begin  with.  The  mist 
which  arose  as  you  discoursed  has  blurred  for  me  some  of  the 
rather  unmistakable  features  of  Everybody's  World,  my  old, 
familiar,  somewhat  faulty,  friend. 

"Thus,  the  physical  world  recognized  by  science  and  by  com- 
mon thought  has  lost  its  sharpness  of  outline.  It  has  been  indi- 
cated that  it  exists  only  in  minds,  and  is  something  taken  up  by 
minds  as  a  convenient  social  convention.  It  has  been  asserted 
that  its  laws  are  only  relatively  uniform,  and  that,  in  general, 
the  distinction  between  physical  and  mental,  outer  and  inner, 
is  not  to  be  taken  very  seriously.  That  the  individual  hap- 
penings in  the  world  are  subject  to  causality  has  been  denied. 
My  respect  for  scientific  method  has  suffered  a  diminution,  in 
that  the  inductive  processes,  of  which  science  makes  so  much, 
have  been  first  accorded  a  grudging  recognition  and  then 
abandoned  for  a  deductive  process  at  which  science  can  only 
stand  aghast.  In  various  places  the  special  sciences  have  been 
the  object  of  remarks  that  sound  disparaging.^^  The  signifi- 
cance of  mathematical  reasonings  seems  to  have  been  mis- 
apprehended in  a  way  which  suggests  a  much  earlier  period 
in  the  history  of  philosophy. 

"As  to  the  relations  of  minds  to  bodies,  and,  through  these, 
to  each  other  —  these  have  become  highly  obscure.     It  ap- 

Q 


2  26  The   World  We  Live  In 

pears  to  be  indicated  that  minds  can,  and  yet  cannot,  be  di- 
rectly aware  of  the  contents  of  other  minds.'^^  Everybody, 
'completely  embodied,'  appears  to  be  everybody  else;  and  no 
one  seems  to  be  aware  of  what  he  thinks  and  wills.  I  have 
been  informed  that  I  am  not  really  as  ignorant  as  I  had  sup- 
posed, but  am  omniscient  and  am  merely  inattentive  to  the 
details  of  an  infinite  Universe,  all  of  which  details  I  might 
clearly  know  if  I  only  would. 

"In  all  this,  I  have  been  carried  far,  surely,  from  the  body 
of  human  knowledge,  in  which  men  have,  and  beheve  they 
have  reason  to  have,  confidence.  On  the  whole,  I  have  lost, 
and  have  not  gained.  I  have  failed  to  reach  the  Promised 
Land,  and  the  ground  actually  beneath  me  has  become  less 
sohd.  With  infinite  thanks  for  your  patience,  I  find  I  must 
seek  some  other  guide.  Should  nothing  better  offer,  I  may 
even  lay  hands  violently  upon  myself  and  turn  Pragmatist. 
Only  assure  me  that  I  am  not  grasping  at  the  rainbow,  and  I 
will  be  discouraged  by  no  difficulties  and  deterred  by  no 
dangers." 

Again  the  revolt  of  the  man  to  whom  the  accepted  body  of 
human  knowledge,  admittedly  defective  and  incomplete,  still 
seems  a  thing  too  serious  to  be  treated  lightly  !  of  the  man  who 
is  incHned  to  be  mistrustful  of  the  speculations  of  the  soKtary 
thinker,  and  who  is  dissatisfied  if  he  cannot,  from  time  to  time, 
feel  the  ground  with  his  foot.  Shall  we  be  with  liim  ?  or  shall 
we  be  against  him  ? 

That,  I  suppose,  will  be  decided  for  the  indi\ddual  largely 
by  his  temperament,  in  spite  of  what  any  one  may  say.  There 
are  those  who  take  easily  to  speculative  flights,  and  who  do 
not  find  belief  difficult. 

For  my  part,  as  a  commonplace  man,  to  whom  Everybody's 
World  seems  a  very  imdeniable  thing,  I  must  admit  that  my 
first  impulse  is  to  watch  from  the  field  the  flight  of  the  aviator, 
filled  with  admiration  of  his  daring,  his  ingenuity,  and  his 


The  Glory  of  It  227 

confidence  in  his  own  power  to  manage  his  machine.  After 
that  comes  a  certain  curiosity  to  appreciate  the  real  motives 
which  inspired  him  to  make  such  seemingly  superhuman  efforts 
and  to  face  such  unusual  dangers.  What  does  he  seek? 
What  does  he  hope  to  find  ?  Is  it  an  Unknowable  ?  the 
search  is  condemned  from  the  outset.  Is  it  that  phantom 
Reality  that  played  hide-and-seek  with  us  in  Chapter  XIII, 
but  always  turned  out,  when  cornered,  to  be  mere  Appearance, 
and  no  Reality  at  all  ?  No  man  who  understands  the  game 
will  find  it  worth  liis  wliile  to  play  it.  Is  the  object  of  the 
flight  to  rise,  Hke  the  lark,  into  the  upper  air,  to  sing  a  tauto- 
logical song  of  illusive  sweetness,  and  to  descend  upon  the 
selfsame  spot  which  saw  the  beginning  of  the  flight  ?  Surely 
there  must  be  some  other  aim  than  this. 

"Some  in  one  way  and  some  in  others,"  said  the  Oxford 
Idealist,  ''we  seem  to  touch  and  have  communion  with  what 
is  beyond  the  visible  world.  In  various  manners  we  find 
sometliing  higher,  which  both  supports  and  humbles,  both 
chastens  and  transports  us.  And,  with  certain  persons,  the 
intellectual  effort  to  understand  the  universe  is  a  principal 
way  of  thus  experiencing  the  Deity."  These  are  not  the  words 
of  one  the  mutilation  of  whose  nature  has  been  made  whole 
by  the  contemplation  of  a  logical  abstraction.  One  reads  with 
unseeing  eyes,  if  one  finds  in  liis  book  no  more  than  the  book 
itself  seems  to  claim. 

Nor  can  one  read  sympathetically  the  work  discussed  in 
this  and  in  the  preceding  chapter  without  seeing  that  it  contains 
much  more  than  the  dry  bones  of  theory.  To  examine  these 
with  care,  and  to  decide  whether  they  are  properly  articulated, 
is,  to  be  sure,  the  duty  of  other  pliilosophers.  It  is  a  some- 
what thankless  task,  as  is  all  criticism ;  but  it  is  a  necessary 
task,  for  he  who  advances  a  theory  of  his  own  leaves  his  work 
half  done  unless  he  points  out  that  rival  claimants  to  the  field 
have  not  annulled  his  own  claim.     In  the  present  instance,  the 


228  The   World  We  Live  In 

ungrateful  task  of  criticism  is  in  part  redeemed  by  the  fact 
that  a  careful  reading  inspires  the  critic  with  a  lively  admira- 
tion of  the  boldness  of  the  speculative  genius  possessed  by  the 
author,  and  with  an  agreeable  sense  of  the  breadth  and  fer- 
tility of  his  imagination. 

Nevertheless,  when  all  is  said,  it  is  not  the  dry  bones  of 
theory  that  constitute  the  attraction  of  the  book.  It  is  its 
Hving  spirit.  And  the  connection  between  the  two  seems 
to  be  so  slight  that  one  is  tempted  to  ask  oneself :  May  it  not 
be  that  the  bony  structure  is  a  something  relatively  accidental  ? 
May  not  the  premises  be  a  precipitate  from  the  conclusion  — 
a  shell  secreted  to  support  a  hfe  which  already  existed  and 
asserted  its  right  to  be  ?  Philosophers  are  but  men,  after 
all ;  and  some  of  them  are  men  of  strongly  rehgious  instincts. 

The  attitude  of  the  author  toward  the  world  in  which  he 
finds  himself  has,  viewed  broadly,  much  in  common  with  that 
taken  by  philosophers  of  various  schools  who  find  it  impossible 
to  admit  his  premises  and  to  approve  of  his  reasonings.  It  is 
not  widely  different  from  that  of  many  plain  men,  who  feel 
that  they  must  accept  Everybody's  World,  although  they  are 
more  or  less  oppressed  by  its  presence.  Hence,  it  does  not 
follow  that,  in  rejecting  the  New  Idealism,  one  must  nec- 
essarily regard  oneself  as  separated  by  an  immeasurable  abyss, 
in  spirit  and  feehng,  from  the  New  Idealist.  One  may  share 
with  him  an  earnest  desire  to  tread  the  streets  of  the  Eternal 
City,  while  accepting  with  reservation  the  adage  that  all  roads 
lead  thither,  and  denying  emphatically  that  the  safest  and  the 
surest  route  is  that  which  tempts  the  regions  of  the  air. 


CHAPTER  XVI 

PLAYING   WITH   THE   WORLD 

"Faithful,"  said  Christian  as  they  journeyed,  "we  have 
been,  by  the  inhabitants  of  the  City  of  Destruction,  abominably 
misunderstood.  They  accuse  us  of  holding  all  sorts  of  wild 
opinions,  of  denying  palpable  fact,  of  shutting  our  eyes  to  the 
realities  which  every  man  of  sense  must  admit.  And  they 
shamelessly  maintain  that  we  wander  aimlessly  and  without 
method.^ 

"Now,  the  one  thing  that  does  characterize  us  as  Pragmatists 
is  our  method.^  We  do  not  pretend  to  be  dogmatic ;  to  con- 
struct a  chart  with  fixed  routes  laid  down  upon  it  in  ink,  and 
to  claim  that  all  men  must  follow  directions  that  we  dictate. 
We  allow  to  others  the  same  freedom  which  we  claim  for 
ourselves.  The  salvation  of  the  world  must  lie  in  an  escape 
from  the  unendurable  regularity  of  Everybody's  World,  the 
City  of  Destruction,  the  town  upon  which  we  have  turned  our 
backs.  So  much  is  quite  plain.  But  it  is  not  worth  while  to 
set  out  with  a  load  upon  one's  back.  He  travels  light  who  car- 
ries with  him  only  one  or  two  easy  maxims :  '  Wherever  you 
may  find  yourself,  look  forward  and  not  backwards ' ;  '  Expect 
the  unexpected ' ;  '  Face  the  light '  —  surely  a  simple  matter 
if  a  man  will  only  cast  his  own  hght  before  him  as  he  walks. 

"The  reasonableness  of  our  journey  cannot  admit  of  dispute. 
What  a  town  that  was  !  the  sordid  monotony  of  it !  Every 
day  the  sun  rose,  climbed  to  the  zenith,  and  set,  running  his 
appointed  course  with  a  stupid  lack  of  ingenuity  which  made 
him  at  every  hour  the  slave  of  every  mathematician  with  pen- 

229 


230  The   World  We  Live  In 

cil  and  paper.  And  the  clocks  which,  left  to  themselves,  might 
have  shown  some  individuality,  were  drilled  into  a  servile 
imitation  of  his  wearisome  mechanical  precision.  The  men, 
Httle  better,  left  their  beds  by  them,  worked  by  them, 
dined  by  them,  and  retired  to  rest  at  their  command,  Hke 
recruits  under  a  Prussian  sergeant.  Everything  seemed  or- 
dered. The  thermometer  rose  and  fell  at  the  bidding  of  the 
heat  and  cold ;  the  barometer  played  the  courtier  to  its  over- 
lord the  weather;  and  even  the  weather,  which  has  every- 
where shown  its  self-respect  by  raising  its  voice  for  freedom, 
was,  there  is  strong  reason  to  beheve,  secretly  obeying  instruc- 
tions passed  on  to  it  unobstrusively,  but  none  the  less  imperi- 
ously, by  some  other  power.  The  Future  seemed  to  rise 
helplessly  from  the  ashes  of  the  Past  —  a  fettered  Phoenix, 
the  very  color  of  whose  feathers  could  be  foretold.  And  the 
past  behavior  of  men  and  things  was  anxiously  scrutinized  be- 
fore any  one  had  the  courage  to  predict  what  might  be  expected 
from  men  and  things  on  days  as  yet  unborn.  Science  raged 
unchecked,  saving  some  from  disaster  and  death,  it  must  be 
admitted,  but  throwing  a  somber  pall  over  the  roseate  hopes 
of  the  young  and  inexperienced  —  a  very  Juggernaut,  careless 
of  the  sufferings  occasioned  by  his  triumphal  progress  to  any 
'  happy-go-lucky  anarchistic  sort  of  creature '  ^  too  sunk  in  his 
dreams  to  mark  the  progress  of  the  fateful  car, 

"You  will  remember,  too,  that  there  was  no  real  privacy; 
no  man  could  feel  himself  quite  alone,  and  truly  his  own  master. 
Every  street  was  determined  in  its  relation  to  every  other 
street ;  every  house  was  on  some  street  or  other,  and  at  a  fixed 
distance  from  some  other  house ;  every  man  had  a  neighbor 
whom  it  was  impossible  wholly  to  ignore.  He  who  exhibited 
his  independence  by  moving  out  of  his  house,  and  taking  up  his 
dwelling  in  a  tub,  was  made  a  subject  of  criticism.  It  was 
pointed  out  to  him  that  his  tub  was  a  poor  one  —  that  the  hoops 
were  loose  and  the  staves  let  in  the  sun.^    Nor  could  he  get 


Playing  with  the   World  231 

rid  of  his  critic  by  saying  that  he  liked  the  sun.  Some  officious 
bystander  was  sure  to  remark  that  a  roof  which  admitted  the 
sun  would  as  certainly  admit  the  rain,  and  he  would  then  insist 
upon  an  answer  to  the  impertinent  question :  What  does  it 
profit,  under  such  circumstances,  to  take  refuge  in  a  tub  at  all  ? 
As  if  such  things  were  matters  of  cold  calculation  when  the  sky 
is  blue  and  the  sun  resplendent !  Nor  was  there  even  freedom 
of  speech  in  the  intolerant  city.  Can  we  call  it  freedom  of 
speech  when  a  man  is  not  permitted  to  use  words  in  a  'large 
loose  way '  ?  ^  When  he  must  haggle  over  exact  meanings, 
must  employ  his  terms  always  in  the  same  sense,  and  must 
offer  proof  for  all  his  statements  ?  ^  A  poor  town,  say  I : 
a  mean  town ;  a  town  of  prim  New  England  neatness,  but 
with  none  of  the  breezy  largeness  of  the  West. 

"Contrast  with  the  stifling  atmosphere  of  orderly  repres- 
sion, from  which  we  made  our  escape,  the  generous  measure 
of  freedom  which  has  since  been  ours.  The  very  road  on  which 
we  plant  our  feet  we  may  claim  to  be  our  own,  although  we 
have  never  before  traveled  it.  In  a  sense,  it  is  true,  it  may  be 
called  a  highv/ay  traveled  by  other  pilgrims ;  but,  surely,  only 
in  a  loose  sense,  for  no  two  need  follow  precisely  the  same  path, 
nor  need  any  two  have  before  them  precisely  the  same  goal. 
The  striking  fact  that  guarantees  our  hberty  and  allows  free 
play  to  individuality  is  that  the  whole  universe  through  which 
our  road  leads  must  be  regarded  as  incomplete,^  as  imperfectly 
unified,^  as  loosely  connected,^  as  growing  in  every  part,^" 
and  as  awaiting  the  additions  which  we  ourselves  are  about  to 
make  to  it.^^ 

"In  the  pestilent  city  which  we  have  left,  men  would  not 
admit  that  they  made  reahty,  except  in  that  Hmited  and  hum- 
drum sense  in  which  carpenters  may  be  said  to  make  chairs 
and  statesmen  to  make  history.  When  they  did  not  know 
where  a  given  house  was,  they  nevertheless  assumed  that  it 
must  be  definitely  somewhere,  and  that  their  knowing  or  not 


232  The   World  We  Live  In 

knowing  did  not  affect  its  particular  street  and  number,  or 
bring  it  into  a  more  or  a  less  intimate  topographical  relation 
to  the  other  houses  on  its  block,  or  to  the  City  Hall.  They  were 
all  inclined  to  divorce  knowledge  and  reality,  and  to  make  it 
the  duty  of  knowledge  to  accept  dictation  and  to  follow  humbly 
in  the  footsteps  of  what  they  called  evidence.  Whereas,  in  our 
pragmatic  world  of  broader,  if  more  indefinite,  horizons,  we 
know  that  knowledge  and  reality  cannot  thus  be  divorced.  In 
coming  to  know,  we  are  affecting  the  structure  of  the  universe  it- 
self ;  ^^  building  out  to  greater  completion  an  unfinished  world, ^^ 
knitting  together  what  must  remain  at  loose  ends  until  we 
have  brought  its  floating  parts  into  connection.  The  world 
is  not  a  cheap,  ready-made  unit,  but  human  efforts  are  daily 
unifying  it  more  and  more."  It  is  imperfectly  unified  even 
now,  after  all  the  labor  that  we  and  our  predecessors  have 
spent  upon  it,  and  perhaps  it  will  always  remain  imperfectly 
unified. ^^  Some  parts  of  it  may  really  be  very  loosely  connected 
with  other  parts.^^  In  our  cognitive  Hfe,  as  well  as  in  our  prac- 
tical, we  are  creative  —  we  add  to  reality,  both  to  things  and 
to  their  qualities. ^^ 

"It  is  inevitable  that  our  doctrine  should  be  misunderstood 
by  those  pedants  of  the  schools  who  revel  in  abstractions  and 
shun  the  concrete.  By  men  who  talk  of  'Truth,'  and  forget 
that  only  concrete  truths  exist ;  ^^  who  prate  of  'Reality,'  and 
overlook  the  fact  that  no  man  can  come  in  contact  with 
anything  real  save  in  the  shape  of  individual  realities.^^  To 
appreciate  our  freedom  in  contributing  to  the  structure  of  the 
universe,  and  to  realize  as  we  should  our  dignity  and  respon- 
sibility as  creators, ^°  we  must  fix  our  attention  upon  the  con- 
crete instance.  Just  consider,  for  example,  the  South  Pole  — 
we  may  assume  it  to  exist,  for  the  belief  appears,  on  the  whole, 
to  be  expedient.^^  Do  not  suppose  that  I  am  dogmatizing  and 
insisting  that  you  or  any  one  should  believe  really  and  literally 
in  the  South  Pole,  which  science  has  added  to  the  common-sense 


Playing  with  the   World  233 

world  of  our  ordinary  experience.  But  let  us  speak  as  if 
it  existed.^^ 

"Now,  it  must  be  clear  to  any  thoughtful  mind  that  the 
South  Pole  is  very  loosely  connected  even  yet  with  the  Equator. 
Few  women,  on  coming  out  of  their  own  doors,  could  tell  how 
to  turn  in  order  to  face  it ;  very  few  men  could  keep  a  straight 
course,  even  for  a  day,  in  marching  towards  it ;  no  one  has  as 
yet  reached  it  as  a  sensible  terminus  that  can  be  verified 
exactly.-^  It  remains  to  some  future  genius  *  so  to  build  out  this 
incomplete  and  loosely  Jointed  world  that  the  South  Pole  may 
really  be  definitely  related  to  the  Equator,  and  knit  to  it 
closely  — •  at  least  as  closely  as  is  the  North  Pole  now,  though, 
of  course,  the  different  parts  of  the  world  will  always  remain 
incompletely  unified.-*  Should  we  undertake  this  work  of 
unification,  which  happens  to  be  aside  from  our  present  duty, 
you  can  readily  conceive.  Faithful,  what  a  dignified  task  it 
would  be,  and  what  a  responsibility  would  rest  upon  us  to  put 
the  Pole  in  just  the  spot  in  which  it  would,  in  the  long  run,  be 
most  advantageous  to  have  it.^^ 

''The  whole  conception  is  an  inspiring  one  —  a  loose  uni- 
verse, adrift  in  space,  with  such  as  we  in  it  creating  its  truth 
and  reaUty ;  ^^  a  road  which  we  throw  out  before  us  as  we 
journey ;  ^^  and  yonder  shining  light,  which  we  cast  freely  before 
ourselves,  and  which  cannot,  hence,  compel  us,  in  following  it, 
to  stumble  along  stony  paths  and  to  wade  through  doleful 
morasses.^^  A  completely  genial  universe,  that  relieves  the 
tedium  of  the  wayfarer  by  the  exhibition  of  unaccountable 
novelties,  dehghtful  surprises,  for  which  no  past  experience  can 
wholly  prepare  a  man.^^  A  universe,  too,  in  which  no  truth 
that  too  seriously  shocks  our  prejudices,  too  roughly  jolts  our 
susceptibilities,  can  get  itself  established  as  truth.^°    A  universe 

*  Christian  is  a  little  behind  the  times.  It  is  interesting  to  note  that  the 
modest  genius  who  did  the  world  the  service  in  question  announced  the  com- 
pletion of  his  task  in  the  words,  "  We  discovered  the  Pole." 


2  34  ^/^^   World  We  Live  In 

in  which  all  truths  are  either  immediately  or  in  the  long  run 
expedient,  and  are  true  just  in  proportion  to  their  expediency .^^ 
We  are,  indeed,  in  a  fair  world  and  on  a  goodly  road,  and  we 
cannot  too  much  congratulate  ourselves  upon  our  escape  from 
that  dreadful  town  of  red-tape  and  regularity. 

"And  what  houses  of  refreshment  seem  to  be  provided  for 
pilgrims  like  ourselves  !  Think  of  the  homelike  informality 
of  the  hotel  in  which  we  lodged  last  night.  The  generous  for- 
eigner, Papini,  who  presides  over  it,  has  no  rules  to  torment  his 
guests.  His  door  is  always  open,  and  his  corridor  is  as  free  as 
the  public  street.  What  is  done  in  the  several  rooms  of  the 
house  he  does  not  regard  as  his  concern.  You  will  remember 
that  we  found  in  one  of  its  innumerable  chambers  a  man  writ- 
ing an  atheistic  volume ;  in  the  next,  some  one  was  on  his 
knees  praying  for  faith  and  strength ;  in  a  third  a  chemist 
investigated  a  body's  properties.  In  a  fourth,  a  system  of 
ideahstic  metaphysics  was  being  excogitated,  and  in  a  fifth  the 
impossibility  of  metaphysics  was  being  shown.  And  all  of 
the  remarkable  men  thus  occupied  circulated  freely  in  the  prag- 
matic corridor,  and  could  not  carry  on  their  diverse  occupa- 
tions without  it.^^ 

"The  significance  of  the  various  activities  which  employed 
Signor  Papini's  guests  becomes  luminous  only  to  one  who  has 
learned  how  iniquitous  is  the  divorce  between  knowledge  and 
reality  accepted  as  a  matter  of  course  by  the  inhabitants  of 
Everybody's  World.  Having  risen  to  the  conception  that  man 
is  creative  even  in  his  cognitive  capacity,  and  that  reality  is 
incomplete,  and  is  growing,  as  a  result  of  human  efforts,  we  can 
see  that  the  atheist  was  disintegrating  God,  while  the  man  on 
his  knees  was  building  Him  up  again ;  that  the  idealist  was 
turning  the  world  into  ideas,  while  the  scoffer  at  meta- 
physics was  lending  to  it  a  heavy  opacity  which  helped  it  to 
resist  transformation  ;  that  the  chemist  was  creating  the  body 
which  he  was  investigating  and  was  clothing  it  with  attributes 


Playmg  with  the   World  235 

of  his  own  manufacture.^^  Each  man,  in  the  measure  of  his 
abilities,  was  modifying  the  structure  of  the  universe,^^  and 
was  making  truth,^^  much  as  we  are  making  the  road  on  which 
we  now  walk  together.  And  they  lived  in  harmony,  for  none 
gave  serious  attention  to  the  results  obtained  by  any  other, 
all  having  agreed  together  to  have  no  prejudices  whatever,  no 
obstructive  dogmas,  and  no  rigid  canons  of  what  should  count 
as  prooj?^ 

"By  the  way,  Faithful,  did  you  remark  the  absence  of  the 
commercial  traveler?  That  incorrigible  Philistine,  who  in- 
sists upon  having  his  meals  cooked  in  traditional  ways,  and 
served  at  regular  hours,  who  coldly  calculates  his  business 
chances  in  the  future  with  an  eye  shamelessly  turned  upon  his 
experiences  of  the  past,  who  nervously  studies  time-tables,  and 
is  irritated  at  the  suggestion  that  they  are  mere  approximations 
to  truth  and  are  not  intended  really  to  indicate  with  exactitude 
the  time  at  which  trains  may  be  expected  to  arrive  and  leave,^^ 
who  is  full  of  prejudices,  objecting  to  the  detonations  of  the 
chemist  in  the  room  to  the  right  and  to  the  audible  prayers  of 
the  man  on  his  knees  in  the  room  to  the  left,  nourishing  a  sus- 
picion of  the  atheist,  and  growing  restive  under  the  periods  of 
the  idealistic  metaphysician  —  such  as  he  avoid  the  place,  and 
they  refuse  to  set  a  foot  within  the  corridor.  So  much  the 
better  for  the  genial,  easy-going  comfort  of  the  hotel !  High- 
class  hotels  are  not  meant  for  anybody  and  Everybody.  They 
are  lounging  places  for  men  of  leisure  who  can  afford  to  give 
themselves  a  holiday  .^^ 

''But,  help  !  where  are  we  ?  In  talking  I  have  forgotten  to 
watch  my  steps.  Can  it  be  that  we  have  strayed  from  the 
right  path  ?  This  ground  is  soft ;  I  am  sinking ;  and  so,  I 
perceive,  are  you.  Let  me  have  your  hand,  and  let  us  make  for 
that  rising  slope  opposite.     Be  quick,  Faithful,  be  quick  !" 

"Christian,"  said  Faithful,  "you  surprise  me.  How  can 
we  be  on  the  wrong  road  ?    Have  we  not  made  our  road  the 


236  The   World  We  Live  In 

right  one  as  we  went  along,  creating  truth  and  reality  with 
every  mile  that  we  put  behind  us  ?  Have  we  not  steadily 
beheved  that  we  were  on  the  right  road  ?  To  me  it  is  a  shock 
to  think  that  we  are  standing  in  a  bog.  I  cannot  adjust  this 
to  my  previous  stock  of  truths ;  it  jolts  me  grievously  to  admit 
this  new  truth  to  be  a  truth  at  all ;  hence,  I  simply  refuse  to 
admit  it." 

"Faithful,  there  is  no  time  now  to  discuss  the  matter.  Be- 
lieve what  you  please,  but  help  me.  Later  we  can  beat  the 
whole  subject  out  at  our  leisure.  Do  give  me  your  hand.  So, 
I  begin  to  breathe  again.  That  was  a  close  shave  for  us  pil- 
grims !  We  must  not  forget  ourselves  again  as  we  talk.  We 
really  must  watch  our  steps  a  httle.  Another  such  slip, 
and  we  are  done." 

"But,  Christian,  I  am  amazed.  One  would  think  we  were 
still  in  Everybody's  World.  You  appear  to  be  transformed. 
How  can  you  reconcile  what  you  have  been  saying  about  the 
freedom  of  our  pragmatic  universe  and  the  making  of  truth 
and  reality  with  the  panic  you  have  just  been  in,  with  your 
recognition  of  brute  fact,  surely  as  brute  a  fact  as  any  to  be 
met  with  in  the  City  of  Destruction  ?  Do  you  mean  to  main- 
tain that  our  road  is  already  there  ?  that  we  must  find  it,  not 
make  it  ?  that  we  must  study  charts,  and  admit  that  we  are 
encompassed  with  dangers  ?  Is  it  for  this  that  we  have  braved 
the  unknown  and  have  unchained  our  creative  energy  ?  If  we 
really  can  create  both  subjects  and  predicates,  why  may  we  not 
dry  a  bog  so  that  it  could  pass  for  a  patch  on  the  Libyan 
desert?" 

"Faithful,"  said  Christian,  "do  you  not  remember  my 
saying  at  the  outset  of  our  conversation  that  our  old  neighbors 
misunderstood  us,  and  accused  us  of  shutting  our  eyes  to  the 
realities  which  every  man  of  sense  must  admit  ?  Far  enough 
is  far  enough,  say  I,  and  too  much  is  too  much.  Freedom  we 
must  have.     To  secure  that  we  set  out  on  our  journey.     But 


Playing  with  the   World  237 

freedom  must  not  be  allowed  to  degenerate  into  unbridled  li- 
cense. The  Pragmatist  cannot  create  things  out  of  nothing  — 
he  can  only  add  to  reahty.  You  are  young  and  impetuous; 
learn  to  temper  your  zeal  with  caution.  So  far,  I  have  dwelt 
upon  the  positive  side  of  our  doctrine  only.  I  see  it  is  time  to 
point  out  the  hmitations  to  man's  power  which,  even  in  our 
freer  pragmatic  universe,  must  be  recognized  by  a  man  of 
sense. 

"Now,  it  is  quite  true  that  truth  makes  itself,  with  our 
assistance,  as  we  go  ;  ^^  that,  if  we  say :  '  this  is  true  because  it 
is  useful'  or  'this  is  useful  because  it  is  true,'  it  is  all  one ;  ''^ 
that  we  call  a  new  theory  true  when  it  marries  new  facts  with  old 
opinions  in  a  way  to  jar  us  the  least,  and,  hence,  proves  itself 
most  satisfactory  to  us  as  individuals  with  this  or  that  settled 
habit  of  thought ;  '*^  but  this  is  only  half  the  truth.  No  pilgrim 
would  dare  to  take  the  least  excursion  beyond  the  patrolled 
and  lamplit  streets  of  Everybody's  World  were  he  assured 
that  the  Beyond  which  calls  him  were  really  a  realm  of  utter 
lawlessness,  in  which  neither  men  nor  things  can  be  counted 
upon  at  all,  and  where  neither  prudence  nor  prevision  have 
any  significance.  It  is,  in  fact,  a  realm  in  which  the  pilgrim 
must  orient  himself  with  circumspection,  and  must  go  about 
the  making  of  truth  in  a  sensible  way. 

"He  must  recognize,  to  begin  with,  that  there  is  such  a  thing 
as  a  jiux  of  sensations  —  that  such  are  forced  upon  him,  com- 
ing he  knows  not  whence.  Over  their  nature,  their  order,  their 
quantity,  he  has  little  control.^-  Sensation's  irremediable 
flow  "^^  is  not  a  thing  to  trifle  with,  as  we  had  occasion  to  realize, 
when  we  found  ourselves  bemired  a  few  moments  since.  It  is 
as  important  to  remark  that  there  is  a  second  part  of  reality  of 
which  our  beliefs  must  obediently  take  account.  This  is  the 
relations  that  obtain  between  our  sensations,  or  between  their 
copies  in  our  minds.^  One's  beliefs  must  not  play  fast  and 
loose  with  the  order  which  realities  follow  in  his  experience.^^ 


238  The   World  We  Live  In 

Finally,  there  is  the  whole  body  of  previously  accepted  truths, 
which  furnish  a  basis  on  which  every  man  must  stand  who  will 
seek  new  truth. "^^ 

''Truths  are  not  arbitrary  beliefs,  taken  up  recklessly  and 
held  with  unreasoning  obstinacy.  They  are  something  to 
be  verified  and  vaUdated.  Our  minds  are  wedged  tightly  be- 
tween coercions  of  the  sensible  order  and  of  the  ideal  order. 
To  be  true,  our  ideas  must  agree  with  realities,  whether  sensible 
or  abstract,  under  penalty  of  endless  inconsistency  and  frus- 
tration,^^ that  is,  under  penalty  of  being  proved  false.  And 
although  we  Pragmatists  interpret  the  word  'agreement'  in  a 
large,  loose  way,"*^  we  by  no  means  rob  it  of  all  significance. 
Temporary  and  partial  agreements  will  not  serve  our  turn. 
To  be  really  true  an  idea  must  adapt  our  fife  to  the  reality's 
whole  setting.^^  You  see,  thus,  that  although  the  true  is  the 
useful,  is  what  works,  is  the  expedient,  we  escape  the  calumnies 
of  those  who  would  render  us  ridiculous,  by  insisting  that  we 
here  mean  by  expedient  what  is  expedient  on  the  whole,  and  in 
the  long  run.^°  How  long  the  run  must  be  it  is  manifestly  im- 
possible to  say.  Who  can  prove  that  it  serves  man's  expediency, 
or  that  of  any  other  creature,  that  a  crater  on  the  moon 
should  have  a  diameter  of  two  hundred  and  two  miles  rather 
than  of  two  hundred  and  fifty  ?  or,  for  that  matter,  that 
that  particular  crater  should  be  there  at  all  ?  But  here,  as 
elsewhere,  one  must  have  faith,  and  must  fall  back,  in  the 
meantime,  on  other  sorts  of  agreement. 

"Hence,  I  reject  your  reasons  for  refusing  to  admit  the  bog. 
I  felt  the  brute  fact  of  sensation's  irremediable  flow  as  far 
up  as  the  knees.  I  was  compelled  to  submit  to  the  coercions 
of  the  world  of  sense.  As  to  the  shock  you  experienced  in 
finding  us  where  we  were  in  spite  of  previous  behefs,  I  beg 
you  to  observe  that  a  new  truth,  to  justify  its  existence  as 
such,  must  not  merely  derange  previous  beliefs  as  little  as 
possible,  but  7nusl  lead  to  some  sensible  terminus  or  other  that  can 


Playing  with  the   World  239 

he  exactly  verified}'^  We  stood  unmistakably  in  the  sensible 
terminus ;  the  verification  was  perception.^-  Your  sense  of 
shock  unquestionably  presented  the  weaker  claim. 

"Be  reasonable.  Avoid  gi\ing  a  color  of  justice  to  the 
slanderous  tongues  of  the  unenHghtened.^^  Pragmatism  does 
not  stand  for  irresponsible  nonsense,  'Pent  in,  as  the  Prag- 
matist  more  than  any  one  else  sees  himself  to  be,  between 
the  whole  body  of  funded  truths  squeezed  from  the  past  and 
the  coercions  of  the  world  of  sense  about  him,  who  so  well  as 
he  feels  the  immense  pressure  of  objective  control  under 
which  our  minds  perform  their  operations  ? '  ^^ 

"Nevertheless,  the  Pragmatist  may  still  rejoice  in  regarding 
himself  as  a  maker  of  truth  and  reality.  He  enjoys  a  sober 
freedom.  Is  he  not  free  to  take  the  number  27  as  the  cube  of  3, 
or  as  the  product  of  3  and  9,  or  as  26  plus  i  ?  Can  he  not 
regard  a  chessboard  as  white  squares  on  a  black  ground,  or 
black  squares  on  a  white  ground  ?  Is  not  each  conception  a 
true  one  ?  Even  in  dealing  with  what  is  so  remote  and  seem- 
ingly independent  of  us  as  the  heavenly  bodies,  can  he  not  call 
the  same  constellation  Charles's  Wain,  the  Great  Bear,  or  the 
Dipper?  None  of  these  names  will  be  false,  for  all  will  be 
appHcable.^^  Thus,  although  it  remains  a  stubborn  fact 
that  there  is  a  sensible  flux,  it  is  also  true  that  what  is  true 
of  it  seems  from  first  to  last  to  be  largely  a  matter  of  our 
creation. ^^  The  affair  of  the  bog  I  here  pass  over ;  under 
the  circumstances,  we  could  do  little  with  that." 

"Christian,"  said  Faithful,  "the  concessions  you  now  make 
to  the  prejudices  of  Everybody's  World  seem  to  me  to  curtail 
our  freedom  to  an  extent  which  renders  doubtful  the  wisdom 
of  our  leaving  the  City  of  Destruction  at  all.  Even  in  that 
unendurable  place  men  enjoyed  what  they  called  freedom. 
They  made  changes  in  their  universe  by  carrying  chairs  out 
of  one  room  into  another,  and  they  arranged  them  as  they 
pleased.     They  felt  free  to  say  one  dollar,  or  to  say  one 


240  The   World  We  Live  In 

hundred  cents,  quite  indifferently.  When  you  asked  your 
way,  one  man  said  'Turn  to  the  right'  and  another  said 
'Turn  to  the  left,'  according  to  the  position  m  which  it  had 
pleased  each  to  place  his  body.  Nor  did  they  quarrel  when 
one  maintained  that  an  umbrella  was  shorter  than  a  man,  and 
his  neighbor  insisted  that  a  man  was  longer  than  an  umbrella. 
But  they  all  agreed  that  moving  chairs  about  never  created  a 
new  chair;  that  counting  in  cents  did  not  fatten  the  purse; 
that  varying  one's  form  of  expression  in  pointing  out  the  loca- 
tion of  a  house  did  not  transport  the  house  from  one  street  to 
another ;  that  men  and  umbrellas  have  definite  lengths  which 
may  be  measured  in  feet  and  inches,  and  which  do  not  vary 
with  our  point  of  view.  They  kept  one  eye  anxiously  fixed 
on  reality,  whatever  they  did  with  the  other,  and  they  picked 
their  steps  in  the  world  as  though  they  were  always  under  dicta- 
tion. Knowledge  they  valued ;  and  they  admitted,  in  a  gen- 
eral way,  its  expediency,  for  they  were  always  pointing  out  to 
us  that  a  man  could  not  find  his  way  home  if  he  did  not  know 
his  street  and  number.  But  they  made  of  knowledge  a  thing 
to  be  gained  laboriously,  and  under  the  rod  of  the  schoolmaster. 
A  real  freedom  in  knowing  and  in  deahng  with  things  they  did 
not  enjoy.  Do  you  remember  the  man  who  was  unable  to  fit 
a  large  cork  into  the  neck  of  a  small  bottle,  and  the  contempt 
wdth  which  he  received  our  helpful  suggestion  that  he  try 
regarding  the  diameter  of  the  orifice  as  3  quarters  of  an  inch 
and  that  of  the  cork  as  only  2  half  inches  ?  You  give  up  too 
much ;  and,  I  may  add,  you  detract  from  the  dignity  of 
such  creators  as  are  lodged  in  Signor  Papini's  hotel.  To  hear 
you,  one  would  think  they  were  doing  just  what  Everybody 
does,  which  is  something  very  commonplace,  and  not  properly 
to  be  called  'creation'  at  all. 

"  For  my  part,  I  still  refuse  to  accept  that  swamp.  And  I  go 
farther  than  you  in  the  matter  of  the  flux  and  of  our  additions 
to  it.     We  and  men  like  us  make  practically  the  whole  world 


Playing  with  the   World  241 

in  which  we  find  ourselves  —  the  negligible  residue  may  be 
left  out  of  our  philosophy.  By  the  way,  what  is  that  I  see  in 
the  distance  ?     It  appears  to  move." 

"It  looks  to  me,"  said  Christian,  "like  a  Hon.  Sensations, 
the  relations  between  them,  and  the  body  of  funded  truths 
which  constitute  what  is  called  common  knowledge  conspire 
to  convince  me  that  it  is  a  Hon,  and  that  we  have  escaped 
from  one  peril  only  to  meet  a  worse.  It  is  certainly  approach- 
ing, and  our  way  of  escape  is  cut  off.     We  are  lost  men  ! " 

"Now,  Christian,"  said  Faithful,  "trust  to  me.  Your  mild 
form  of  Pragmatism  is  aU  very  weU  for  ordinary  occasions, 
but.  in  such  an  emergency  as  this,  one  needs  to  be  a  Pragma- 
tist  in  the  Second  Degree,  that  is,  a  Humanist.  Observe  how, 
imder  my  'intelHgent  manipulations,'  that  Hon,  seemingly  so 
'intractable,'  wiU  'grow  plastic,'  and  become  as  harmless  as  a 
tawny  dream." 

"I  will  begin  with  the  flux  of  sensations.  Are  not  color, 
shape,  and  size  something  perceived  by  the  senses  ?  and  are  not 
the  senses  human  —  organs  relative  to  our  needs  ?  It  seems 
to  foHow  of  itself  that  the  objectivity  of  our  perceptions  is  en- 
tirely practical  and  useful  and  teleological.  Our  perceptions 
have  come  to  exist  in  order  that  we  may  Hve  with  our  feUow- 
men.^^  Does  this  not  in  itself  suggest  that  they  cannot  indi- 
cate that  we  are  to  be  kihed  by  a  lion  ? 

"Indeed,  the  flux  of  sensations,  when  critically  examined, 
turns  out  to  be,  until  we  have  tampered  -with  it,  something  so 
nearly  nothing  that  it  scarcely  merits  attention  at  all.  We 
must  accept  a  basis  of  initial  fact,  to  be  sure,^^  but  we  must  dis- 
tinguish between  apparent  fact  and  real.^*'  The  original  fact 
is  not  made,  but  found,  and  in  so  far  is  independent,  I  grant 
you ;  but,  then,  as,  in  its  raw  state,  it  is  most  unsatisfactory, 
we  set  to  work  to  immake  it  and  remake  it.®^  As  originally 
given  it  cannot  be  taken  as  'real  fact'  or  as  '  true  reaHty,'  for  it 
is  reaUy  a  meaningless  chaos.^-    By  a  process  of  selection  and 


242  The   World  We  Live  In 

valuation  we  turn  this  stuff  into  'fact'  in  the  stricter  sense; 
and  in  this  making  of  '  real  reality '  our  interests,  desires, 
and  emotions  play  a  leading  part.^^ 

''Mark,  Christian,  that  without  a  process  of  selection  by  us, 
there  are  no  real  facts  for  us ;  and  this  process  of  selection  is 
immensely  arbitrary.®^  I  know  very  well  that  the  vulgar  say 
that  reality  must  be  discovered,  not  made  ;  but  pragmatically 
this  only  means  that  in  certain  cases  its  behavior  is  such  that 
it  is  practically  inconvenient  or  impossible  to  ascribe  its  reality 
for  us  entirely  to  our  own  subjective  activity.^^  The  whole 
matter  possesses  for  the  Pragmatist  little  interest ;  initial  facts 
or  truths  are  of  small  importance,  and  the  question  about  the 
nature  of  initial  truth  and  reahty  cannot  be  allowed  to  weigh 
upon  our  spirits.^^  'Methodologically,'  as  the  philosophers 
say,  independent  fact  can  be  disregarded ;  we  must  conceive 
every  truth  and  every  reality  now  recognized  as  evolved  from 
the  cognitive  process  in  which  we  now  observe  it."  Thus, 
this  ahen  world,  which  appears  to  coerce  us,  grows  plastic  to 
our  intelligent  manipulations.^^  We  must  assume,  as  a  work- 
ing principle,  thai  the  plasticity  of  fact  is  adequate  for  every  pur- 
pose.^^ 

"It  only  remains  to  apply  these  truths  to  the  concrete  in- 
stance —  to  the  approaching  lion.  It  is  evident  that  the  part 
of  him  which  we  do  not  freely  make,  the  irreducible  fact, 
although  independent  of  us,  is  as  good  as  nothing.  It  is  a 
little  corner  of  chaos  which  we  should  cheerfully  accept. 
Indeed,  it  plays  directly  into  the  hand  of  the  Pragmatist,  for 
it  gives  him  something  to  transform.^"  Who  can  distinguish 
between  the  unreal,  irreducible,  chaotic  shred  of  'fact'  which 
men,  animated  by  their  desires  and  needs,  work  up  into  a  lion, 
and  that  which  they,  also  for  their  own  ends,  work  up  into  a 
sheep  ?  Hence  the  Hon  is  just  what  we  make  it,  and  it  cannot 
even  be  intelligently  discussed  apart  from  the  interests,  pur- 
poses, desires,  emotions,  ends,  goods,  postulations,  and  choices 


Playing  with  the    World  243 

of  man.'^^     Do  you  not  begin  to  see  the  light  ?     Are  you  not 
somewhat  reassured  already  ?  " 

"Not  yet,  Faithful,  for  the  creature  roars  uncommonly  like 
a  lion.  I  do  not  seem  able  to  subject  it  to  the  intelligent  manip- 
ulations which  should  make  it  bleat.  Nor  can  I  feel  that  its 
threatening  aspect  is  adjusted  to  my  interests,  purposes,  de- 
sires, and  emotions.  Make  haste,  or  it  will  be  upon  us  before 
you  have  drawn  its  fangs." 

"Have  no  fear,"  rejoined  Faithful,  "I  have  but  begun. 
Even  though  some  'facts'  do  not  look  as  though  they  would 
speedily  yield  to  human  treatment,  that  is  no  reason  for 
abandoning  our  methodological  principle  of  complete  plas- 
ticity.^- Mark  this :  no  Hon  is  dangerous  unless  it  is  a  real 
lion,  unless  it  is  really  true  that  it  is  a  Hon.  Now,  the  con- 
sideration of  the  nature  of  truth  opens  up  for  us  the  most  hope- 
ful perspectives. 

"Truth  is  pecuKar  to  man.'^^  It  must  have  a  bearing  on 
some  human  interest.'^^  If  an  assertion  is  true,  its  consequences 
must  be  good.''''  Sciences  are  human  constructs,  and  the 
truth  or  falsity  of  a  statement  depends  upon  its  relevance  to  the 
question  raised  in  a  particular  science.^^  Statements  are  true, 
that  is,  good,  when  they  conduce  to  the  purpose  of  the  science ; 
they  are  false,  or  bad,  when  they  thwart  it.^^  And  a  science  is 
good  when  it  harmonizes  our  lifc.^^  Hence,  we  may  say,  speak- 
ing generally,  that  the  true  must  be  the  good,  the  useful,  and 
the  practical.''^  In  the  present  instance,  we  are  not  concerned 
precisely  with  a  science,  but  the  principle  is  the  same.  The 
predication  of  truth  is  dependent  on  relevance  to  a  proximate 
rather  than  to  an  ultimate  scientific  purpose.  The  ordinary 
truths  we  predicate  have  but  Httle  concern  with  ultimate  ends 
and  realities.  They  are  true  (at  least,  pro  tern.)  if  they  serve 
their  immediate  purpose.^"  Do  not  forget  that  truth  and  its 
consequences  are  for  man,^^  and  that  the  consequences  of  a 
true  assertion  must  be  good.'^-     I  beg  to  ask  you,  what  earthly 


244  '^^^^   World  We  Live  hi 

good  could  it  do  to  us  or  to  anybody  that  we  shall  be  devoured 
by  a  Hon  of  our  own  creation,  incapable  of  coming  into  exist- 
ence without  effort  and  agency  on  our  part  ?  ^^  How  would 
that  minister  to  the  needs  of  human  hfe  ?  ^^  It  would  in  the 
highest  degree  bafSe  and  thwart  us.^^  Ergo,  that  is  not  a 
lion,  but  is  a  sheep.     Do  you  feel  better  now  ?  " 

"Not  a  bit,"  moaned  Christian,  ''if  I  really  have  made  that 
lion,  I  seem  quite  unable  to  unmake  and  remake  him.  He 
is  getting  dangerously  near.     Can  you  not  do  something  ?  and 

at  once?" 

"Surely  I  can,  Christian.  Listen  once  more.  Know 
that  truths  can  only  come  into  being  by  'winning  our  accept- 
ance.' ^^  Neither  a  Hon  nor  a  sheep  can  exist  except  as  a 
result  of  our  own  processes  of  selection  and  valuation.  This 
you  have  seen.  And  you  have  yourself  dwelt  upon  man's 
freedom  in  attending  to  this  or  that  element  in  what  you  call 
the  sensible  flux,  pointing  out  the  significance  of  this  for 
human  interests.^^  But  you  have  not  sufficiently  emphasized 
the  truth  that  'facts'  which  do  not  interest  us,  'facts'  that  we 
cannot  use,  tend  to  drop  into  unreaHty.  'Our  neglect  really 
tends  to  make  them  unreal.'  ^^  Let  us  try  this  selective  inat- 
tention upon  the  Hon.  Turn  your  attention  resolutely  to  some- 
thing else.  See  how  the  yellow  Hght  of  the  sun  loses  itself  in 
the  shadows  of  yonder  wood.  Hear  the  Hquid  notes  which 
issue  from  the  leafy  depths,  where  the  birds  have  taken  refuge 
from  the  sultry  heat.  The  world  is  a  fair  world  and  a  joyous. 
Are  you  foUowing  me  ?  " 

"Faithful,  this  is  too  much  to  expect  of  a  mere  man.  That 
ominous  roar  fihs  the  air.  And  as  to  the  protective  value  of 
selective  inattention,  can  you  not  caU  to  mind  the  bones  on 
which  we  chanced  three  days  since,  and  which,  as  we  were  told, 
were  left  on  the  field  by  an  unlucky  wight  who  had  the  mis- 
fortune to  be  deaf,  and  who  paid  no  attention  at  all  to  the  beast 
of  prey  that  sprang  upon  him  from  behind?     That  Hon  we 


Playing  with  the   World  245 

see  is  a  fact,  an  unpleasant  fact,  a  dreadful  reality.  Have  you 
no  place  at  all  for  unpleasant  facts  in  your  philosophy  ?  have 
you  no  means  of  dealing  with  them  ?  " 

"Why,  yes,  Christian,  I  am  not  an  extremist,  and  I  do  recog- 
nize unpleasant  facts.  However,  I  am  thankful  to  say  that  I 
have  several  ways  of  diminishing,  if  not  of  annihilating,  their 
unpleasantness.  To  begin  with,  the  true  Pragmatist  objects 
to  the  use  of  the  word  'coerce'  which  you  permitted  yourself 
to  employ  a  little  while  ago.  He  does  not  admit  the  coercions  of 
objective  fact ;  he  prefers  to  conceive  the  objective  as  that 
which  he  aims  at,  accepts,  and  remakes.  Coercions  are  always 
mitigated  by  acceptance. ^^  When  Kate  submitted  freely  to 
the  commands  laid  upon  her  by  Petruchio,  she  was  no  longer 
a  slave.  She  did  what  she  would,  because  she  would  do 
what  she  had  to  do.  Again,  the  Pragmatist  may  always  regard 
an  unpleasant  fact  as  'the  less  unpleasant  alternative.'^" 
There  is  sure  to  be  something  conceivably  worse,  in  compari- 
son with  which  the  unpleasant  fact  becomes  relatively  agree- 
able. Finally,  the  Pragmatist  may  accept  the  unpleasant  fact 
provisionally,  with  the  intention  of  reducing  it  to  unreahty 
after  a  while.  This  entails  no  serious  consequences.  It  only 
means  a  willingness  to  accept  the  fact  for  the  time  being.^^ 
You  see,  I  take  up  a  moderate  position,  and  yet  I  bring  com- 
fort." 

"Not  to  me,"  said  Christian,  "not  to  me.  In  the  first  place, 
I  object  to  being  freely  coerced  into  the  maw  of  that  raging 
beast.  In  the  second  place,  I  can  think  of  no  alternative  open 
to  me  more  objectionable  than  being  devoured.  And  in  the 
third  place,  I  ask  you,  as  a  sensible  man,  how  I  can  be  expected, 
an  hour  hence,  to  reduce  to  unreality  the  Hon  and  the  fact  that 
I  have  been  eaten  ?  You  seem  to  speak  without  reflection, 
Faithful.  I  find  your  words  as  little  comforting  as  they  are 
convincing.  We  may  as  well  make  up  our  minds  that  we  are 
lost  men  !    But,  hold,  what  is  that  I  see  ?  as  I  live,  it  is  Heed- 


246  The   World  We  Live  hi 

less  stumbling  through  the  hedge  right  into  the  path  of  the 
lion.  He  will  certainly  lose  his  Hfe,  but  we  can  get  away. 
To  think  that  we  should  be  saved  at  such  a  sacrifice  !  Poor 
Heedless  !     Poor  Heedless  !  .  .  .  " 

"Christian,"  said  Faithful,  when  they  had  regained  their 
breath  after  their  headlong  flight,  "I  am  not  sure  that  Heed- 
less is  so  much  to  be  pitied  as  your  last  exclamations  would 
suggest.  I,  too,  have  been  feehng  for  him  a  painful  sympathy ; 
but  I  am  now  convinced  that  this  is  an  unreasoning  weakness 
that  I  should  unmake  and  remake.  It  is  not  true  that  Heed- 
less lost  his  life,  and  I  can  prove  it.  Have  you  not  yourself 
asserted  that  'facts/  as  such,  are  not  true;  that  they  simply 
are  ?  ^^  We  have  seen  that  all  truths  are  human  truths  and 
can  come  into  being  only  by  winning  our  acceptance. ^^  The 
true  means  what  is  valued  by  us,  and,  hence,  a  new  truth  be- 
comes true  only  when  it  is  discovered. ^^  Now,  follow  my  argu- 
ment. We  do  not  know  that  Heedless  has  been  devoured. 
We  have  not  discovered  it.  He  himself  could  not  possibly  have 
verified  the  fact ;  for  while  he  was  alive  he  was  not  yet  killed, 
and,  when  he  was  killed,  he  was  not  in  a  position  to  verify 
anything.  I  do  not  see,  hence,  how  the  truth  that  he  was  de- 
voured could  possibly  have  gotten  itself  verified  by  this  time. 
Who  was  there  to  accept  it?  As  to  the  chances  of  other 
pilgrims  wandering  into  that  infested  swamp  and  collecting 
evidence  that  can  make  it  true  that  Heedless  died,  that  is  too 
remote  a  contingency  to  plague  us.  It  is,  then,  not  true  that 
he  did  die ;  perhaps  it  never  will  become  true.  It  is  not  rea- 
sonable to  allow  mere  fact,  as  such,  to  weigh  upon  our  spirits,^^ 
and  I,  for  one,  refuse  to  antedate  my  sympathy. 

"But  enough  of  a  disagreeable  subject.  Let  us  look  forward 
with  cheerfulness,  and  dismiss  the  past  from  our  minds. 
Pragmatism  'is  not  a  retrospective  theory.  Its  significance 
does  not  lie  in  its  explanation  of  the  past  so  much  as  in  its 
present  attitude  towards  the  future.     And  so,  Uke  life,  and  as 


Playing  with  the   World  247 

befits  a  theory  of  human  life,  Pragmatism  faces  towards  the 
future.'  ^^  Had  Gil  Bias  been  a  Pragmatist,  he  would  never 
have  allowed  it  to  weigh  upon  his  spirits  that  no  patient  who 
fell  into  the  hands  of  himself  or  of  his  master,  Dr.  Sangrado, 
ever  escaped  with  his  Hfe.  He  would  have  faced  the  future 
with  confidence,  and  would  not  have  abandoned  the  practice 
of  the  medical  profession.  Pragmatism  is  a  doctrine  of  prom- 
ise. Let  us  forget  those  things  which  are  behind  —  the  bones 
upon  which  we  happened,  the  bog,  the  Hon,  poor  Heedless  — 
and  let  us  press  on  to  the  creation  of  new  truth  and  reaHty 
adjusted  to  the  interests,  purposes,  desires,  emotions,  ends, 
goods,  postulations,  and  choices  of  man.  Forward,  Christian, 
we  must  be  up  and  doing." 

With  this,  Christian  and  Faithful  passed  on  over  the  hill 
and  out  of  my  dream.  But  not  out  of  my  thoughts;  for 
their  conversation  impressed  me  deeply  with  the  gross  injus- 
tice that  men  have  done  them,  both  those  open  enemies  who 
have  attacked  them  with  acrimony  and  those  injudicious 
friends  who  have  encouraged  them  to  submit  their  utterances 
to  tests  of  a  nature  which  they  are  Httle  fitted  to  endure. 

Pragmatism  as  prophecy,  as  the  encouraging  cry  of  a  warm 
heart  to  fellow  beings  in  distress,  as  an  admonition  to  hope, 
so  long  as  hope  is  in  any  way  possible,  and  not  to  give  one's  self 
up  weakly  to  despair  —  this  is  worthy  of  all  praise.  The 
prophet  is  not  concerned  to  describe  accurately  what  lies 
before  his  bodily  eyes.  His  ''Thus  saith  the  Lord  !  "  gains  no 
advantage  from  footnotes  and  from  the  adduction  of  authori- 
ties. The  inner  vision  of  the  moral  enthusiast  triumphs  over 
the  banal  and  often  distressing  details  of  palpable  fact.  The 
ideal  overlays  the  real,  and  it  conceals  from  view  what  the 
passionate  heart  of  the  poet  would  gladly  ignore. 

To  be  sure,  even  the  prophet  must  Hve,  and  to  live  at  all  must 
pick  his  steps  with  some  attention  as  he  wanders  through  the 
wilderness  of  triis  world.     But  he  does  this  as  a  man  —  as  a 


248  The   World  We  Live  hi 

prophet  he  must  not  be  too  hesitating  and  circumspect. 
Prophecy  has  an  honored  place  in  the  world  we  Hve  in.  But 
prophecy  should  not  be  unequally  yoked  with  logical  theory 
and  compelled  to  drag  the  plow  Uke  any  beast  of  burden.  So 
treated,  it  has  been  reduced  to  base  uses,  which  it  can  but  in- 
differently serve,  strain  every  nerve  as  it  will. 

Nor  should  the  generous  willingness  of  the  prophet  to  submit 
himself  to  the  harness  induce  us  to  take  advantage  of  him. 
Both  Christian  and  Faithful  have,  it  is  true,  presented  them- 
selves as  logical  theorists.  Every  man  may  be  excused  for 
only  partially  understanding  liis  own  nature  and  the  purposes 
which  he  is  best  fitted  to  serve.  Nevertheless,  if  we,  too,  are 
generous,  we  wall  not  omit  to  note  that  they  have  been  un- 
mistakably guarded  in  their  utterances. 

A  logician  who  calls  himself  a  happy-go-lucky  anarcliistic 
sort  of  creature,  and  who  expresses  himself  as  indifferent  to  the 
fact  that  the  staves  of  his  syllogisms  do  not  hold  together,  has 
almost  told  us  in  so  many  words  that  he  claims  no  kinsliip  with 
Aristotle.  He  who  informs  us  that  the  human  reason,  ever 
gloriously  human,  "mercifully  interposes  an  impenetrable  veil 
between  us  and  any  truth  or  reahty  which  is  wholly  alien  to  our 
nature,"  ^^  has  expressly  reserved  the  right  either  to  omit 
premises  or  to  reject  the  logical  precipitate  we  call  a  conclusion. 
Aristotle  and  such  as  he  are  not  dithyrambic.^^  They  dance  a 
solemn  dance  and  a  tiresome,  and  their  music  is  monotonous. 

It  is  to  bring  out  the  fact  that  the  Pragmatists,  the  real 
Pragmatists,  should  wo/ be  treated  as  logical  theorists,  and  should 
not  be  held  accountable  for  every  idle  word,  that  the  above 
conversation  between  Christian  and  Faithful  has  been  reported. 
The  fact  seems  to  have  been  overlooked,  very  much,  I  think,  to 
the  detriment  of  Pragmatism,  in  a  great  part  of  the  extensive 
literature  which  has  made  its  appearance  within  the  last  few 
years,  and  through  which  those  of  us  who  read  philosophy  have 
felt  it  our  duty  conscientiously  to  wade.     In  the  dense  jungle 


Playing  with  the   World  249 

of  articles,  enthusiastic,  denunciatory,  expository,  critical, 
controversial,  conciliatory,  and  apologetic,  which  has  sprung 
up  overnight,  a  sense  of  humor  is  conspicuously  lacking.  That 
is  treated  as  seriously  intended  for  science  which  had  its  origin 
in  a  temperamental  revolt  against  the  bloodless  reasonableness 
of  science.  Various  shades  of  Pragmatism  have  been  dis- 
tinguished from  one  another  with  laborious  minuteness.  It  has 
become  possible  for  the  Pragmatist  to  say  :  "We  are  Thirteen," 
as  Wordsworth's  wise  child,  overlooldng  reservations  and  dis- 
tinctions, found  it  practicable  to  say,  "We  are  Seven." 

The  very  generosity  and  kindly  tolerant  spirit  of  the  Prag- 
matist have  filled  up  his  camp  with  men  in  uniforms  of  all  cuts 
and  all  colors ;  with  men,  in  some  cases,  indeed,  equipped  with 
little  save  a  cartridge  belt  or  a  pair  of  spurs.  Those  in  full 
regimentals  have  not  turned  upon  them  the  cold  shoulder,  pro- 
vided only  they  showed  themselves  animated  with  a  decent 
resentment  against  the  "intellectualist." 

Perhaps  it  will  be  said :  Why,  if  there  may  be  various  sorts 
of  realists  and  of  ideahsts,  may  there  not  also  be  various 
sorts  of  Pragmatists,  wise  and  otherwise,  good  and  bad  ?  To 
this  I  am  bound  to  answer,  I  know  of  no  reason.  But  some  dis- 
tinctions are  of  minor  importance,  and  it  does  not  seem  worth 
while  to  dwell  upon  them  unduly.  Others  are  fundamental. 
Thus,  I  should  regard  it  as  of  the  utmost  importance  to  dis- 
tinguish the  logical  theorist,  as  such,  from  the  whole  body  of 
those  who  exercise  the  functions  of  the  prophet.  If  the  latter 
have  preempted  the  name,  Pragmatist,  the  former,  in  adopting 
it,  seems  compelled  to  take  some  risk  of  being  misconceived. 
The  legal  right  to  assume  a  title  cannot,  of  course,  be  disputed. 
Things  have  come  to  a  sorry  pass  in  the  United  States  if  a  man 
is  not  as  free  to  call  himself  "  Pragmatist"  as  to  call  himself 
"Colonel."  We  all  know  that  the  assumption  of  the  latter 
designation  does  not  compel  one  to  adopt  the  profession  of 
arms,  or  even  to  exhibit  a  bellicose  disposition.     Between  colo- 


250  The   World  We  Live  In 

nels  military  and  colonels  titular  there  is,  however,  an  impor- 
tant difference.  There  appears  little  excuse  for  confusing  them. 
So  it  is  with  Pragmatisms. 

Nevertheless,  a  man  of  a  reflective  turn  of  mind  will  be  im- 
pelled to  ask  himself  in  all  seriousness  how  it  is  that  Pragmatism 
as  prophecy  and  Pragmatism  as  logical  theory  show  a  certain 
tendency  to  pass  into  one  another,  a  tendency  evident  even  in 
the  case  of  the  real  Pragmatists,  Christian,  Faithful,  and  those 
who  stand  nearest  to  them.  The  explanation  of  this  tendency 
concerns  very  nearly  the  doctrine  set  forth  in  this  book,  and 
justifies  the  insertion  of  a  chapter  on  Pragmatism.  For  the 
Pragmatist  is  a  man  who  has  realized,  as,  indeed,  a  man  should 
realize,  that  the  world  we  live  in  is  the  World  as  Phenomenon, 
and  is  not  presented  to  us  at  all  except  as  it  is  presented  to 
our  senses  and  known  by  our  intellect.  It  is  a  human  world, 
our  world,  not  the  world  of  some  other  creature  differently  con- 
stituted. In  Chapter  VIII,  I  have  dwelt  upon  the  significance 
of  this  thought,  and  have  tried  to  show  that  the  recognition  of 
the  truth  in  no  way  compels  us  to  confuse  psychology  and  phys- 
ics, the  subjective  and  the  objective,  knowledge  and  the  reahty 
known.  It  is  a  truth  of  which  both  common  thought  and  science 
have  taken  account  instinctively  all  along,  and  have  thus  been 
saved  from  playing  fast  and  loose  with  reality  and  from  making 
shipwreck  hopelessly  on  the  rock  of  pure  incoherence. 

Now,  it  is  rather  easy  to  slip  from  the  notion  that  the  world 
is  our  world  in  one  sense  to  the  belief  that  it  is  our  world  in 
another.  We  are  accustomed  to  think  that  a  man  may  do  what 
he  will  with  his  own.  Can  we  call  the  world  our  own  so  long 
as  we  are  compelled  to  remain  in  bondage  to  the  rules  of  the 
inductive  and  deductive  logic  recognized  impHcitly  or  explicitly 
by  common  thought  and  by  science  ?  So  long  as  we  must  walk 
slowly  and  laboriously  over  uncertain  ground,  seeking  with  one 
foot  for  a  bit  of  firm  sod  before  we  can  draw  the  other  from  the 
mud  into  which  it  has  sunk  ?     That  the  world  is  to  some  degree 


Playing  with  the   World  251 

our  own  to  unmake  and  remake  as  we  please,  even  common 
sense  admits.  And  when  it  breaks  in  upon  our  minds  that  the 
World  is  Phenomenon,  our  Phenomenon,  what  more  natural 
than  that  it  should  occur  to  us  to  claim  a  larger  right  ?  This 
larger  right  the  Pragmatist  as  prophet  passes  over  to  the 
Pragmatist  as  logician.  The  procedure  is  entirely  natural, 
and  testifies  to  the  generosity  of  his  impulses.  That  the 
Pragmatist  as  logician  should  receive  the  gift  is  not  as  creditable 
to  his  caution. 

If  there  is  any  sort  of  Pragmatism  as  logical  theory  which 
wholly  avoids  falling  into  this  natural  error ;  if  there  is  any 
which  recognizes  that  the  mechanism  of  our  knowing,  the 
volitional  character  of  our  mental  life,  our  reasons  for  wishing 
to  know  or  to  know  this  rather  than  that,  the  utiUty  of  knowl- 
edge, the  disadvantages  of  ignorance,  and  so  forth,  are  matters 
which,  while  undoubtedly  of  significance  for  certain  sciences, 
can  wholly  be  abstracted  from  when  we  are  concerned  with  other 
matters,  such  as  the  date  of  Cfesar's  birth,  the  distances  of  the 
stars,  the  size  of  the  cork  which  will  fit  a  given  bottle,  the 
question  whether  two  witnesses  observed  the  assault  alleged 
to  have  been  made  on  the  plaintiff  on  Wednesday  —  if,  I  say, 
there  is  any  form  of  Pragmatism  as  logical  theory  which  can 
and  does  distinguish  thus  clearly  between  objective  fact  and  our 
knowledge  of  it,  how  we  come  to  know  it,  and  how  we  like  or 
dislike  it  when  known,  then  there  is  nothing  in  this  chapter  that 
can  be  construed  as  a  criticism  of  that  particular  sort  of 
Pragmatism.  It  may  retain  the  name,  for  me.  To  its  emphasis 
upon  the  truths  that  the  World  is  Phenomenon,  that  all  crea- 
tures do  not  experience  the  same  phenomena,  and  that  our 
mental  life  is  pervasively  volitional,  I  make  not  the  least  objec- 
tion. 

But  a  Pragmatism  that  finds  it  difficult  to  walk  thus  soberly, 
and  prefers  to  claim  a  larger  freedom  —  the  freedom  of  such  hos- 
telries  as  Signor  Papini's  hotel  —  must,  I  think,  be  accused,  if, 


252  The   World  We  Live  In 

indeed,  we  take  it  as  logical  theory  and  think  it  worth  while 
to  bring  a  formal  accusation  against  it,  of  playing  with  the 
world,  of  treating  with  levity  the  body  of  knowledge  that  the 
long  travail  of  the  ages,  not  yet  accompHshed,  has  laboriously 
brought  together  for  the  enlightenment  of  mankind.  It  does 
injustice  to  Everybody's  World,  and  that  is  an  offense  com- 
mitted against  Everybody.  As  I  have  said,  however,  I  con- 
sider it  a  wrong  to  bring  Pragmatism  into  court  in  this  way  at 
all.  The  spectacle  of  an  officer  of  the  law  coercing  a  prophet 
must  be  distasteful  to  every  man  of  feeling.  The  true  prophet 
is  a  useful  creature,  and  worthy  of  no  little  respect.  He  should 
be  allowed  to  go  on  his  way  unmolested.  I  shall  come  back  to 
him  in  the  last  chapter  of  tliis  book. 


CHAPTER  XVII 

THE  WORLD   OF   SOBER   EARNEST 

He  who  has  traveled  far  and  has  seen  much  should  surely 
not  come  home  quite  empty  handed.  The  voyages  we  have 
made  in  the  realms  of  the  philosophers  have,  I  hope,  brought 
us  back  rich  in  experience,  if  in  nothing  else,  lighter  by  the 
loss  of  some  prejudices,  more  willing  to  look  with  appreciative 
eyes  upon  the  old  home  in  which  dwell  most  of  our  friends  and 
acquaintances,  sohd  men  who,  whether  they  travel  or  not, 
appear  to  make  a  good  deal  of  their  lives  and  to  be  by  no  means 
void  of  discretion.  Are  we  in  a  position  to  tell  them  things 
that  they  did  not  know  before  ?  Can  we  point  out  to  them 
excellencies  or  defects  in  the  constitution  of  their  state,  to  which 
they  have  remained  blind  or  of  which  they  have  been  only 
half  conscious?  Certainly  many  of  them  look  to  us  for  such 
information.  Some  of  them  expect  of  us  more  than  we  are, 
I  fear,  in  a  position  to  impart. 

But  we  can  certainly  do  something.  Let  us  see  what  we 
can  do.  First  of  all,  we  can  banish  from  the  Hght  of  day  that 
threatening  but  bodiless  specter,  the  universal  skepticism  which, 
standing  upon  no  ground  itself,  tries  to  cut  away  the  ground 
beneath  the  feet  of  established  knowledge.  He  who  would  get 
anywhere  and  do  anything  at  all,  must  be  somewhere  or  other 
to  begin  with.  The  universal  skeptic  is  nowhere  —  neither  on 
land,  on  the  water,  or  in  the  air.  We  need  not  fear  him,  for 
there  is  nothing  against  which  he  can  push  or  pull.  To  be  sure, 
his  visits  are  more  apt  to  plague  the  philosopher  in  his  cell 
than  the  busy  citizen  of  Everybody's  World,  who  works  by 
day  and  sleeps  by  night.     He  is  an  ethereal  creature,  and  the 

253 


2  54  The   World  We  Live  In 

unwholesome  phosphorescent  Hght  by  which  he  faintly  shines 
is  rendered  well-nigh  invisible  by  the  rising  of  the  sun.  Still, 
he  pays  an  occasional  visit  even  to  men  of  robust  nature  and 
with  blood  in  their  veins.  He  suggests  to  them  the  unnatural 
suspicion  that  the  whole  body  of  human  knowledge  rests  upon 
an  insecure  foundation.  Usually  he  does  this  by  calling  atten- 
tion to  the  fact  that  certain  bits  of  human  knowledge,  or  what 
have  passed  as  such,  appear  to  the  critical  eye  far  from  satis- 
factory. He  is  careful  not  to  draw  attention  to  the  fact  that 
no  statement  can  be  shown  to  be  unsatisfactory  save  by  an 
appeal  to  other  statements,  which,  if  his  general  contention  is 
correct,  never  ought  to  be  appealed  to  at  all.  I  may  remark, 
in  passing,  that  the  best  friend  of  the  universal  skeptic  is  the 
thoroughgoing  mystic,  who  delights  in  rendering  absurd  definite 
and  systematic  knowledge  in  order  that  he  may  hoist  upon  the 
pedestal  from  which  he  has  dethroned  it  some  reahty  too 
simple  to  formulate  and  too  abstract  to  have  any  real  signifi- 
cance. The  step  from  the  behef  in  the  indescribable,  which 
can  only  be  made  the  subject  of  discussion  at  all  by  mention- 
ing all  the  things  it  is  not,  to  the  belief  in  nothing  at  all,  is  a 
short  one,  and  seems  to  consist  chiefly  in  the  dismissal  of  an 
emotion.^ 

In  the  second  place,  I  hope  we  are  in  a  position  to  make  clear 
that  man  is  not  condemned  to  pass  his  life  fingering  second- 
hand knowledge,  gazing  upon  the  copies  of  things  dogmati- 
cally assumed  to  be  copies,  and  confessing  with  futile  regrets 
that  he  does  not  know  whether  the  copies  are  anythmg  like 
the  things  and  cannot  even  present  any  reasonable  evidence 
that  there  is  a  real  world  of  things  at  all.  In  Chapter  II,  I 
have  shown  how  this  superstition  took  its  rise.  It  is  entirely 
natural  that  it  should  have  taken  its  rise,  and  not  surprising 
that  men  should  tenaciously  cling  to  it  in  theory,  while  disre- 
garding it  in  practice.  But  it  is  the  duty  of  a  clear-minded 
man  to  emancipate  himself  from  it.     He  should  resolutely 


The   World  of  Sober  Earnest  255 

strike  from  his  chart  those  Isles  of  the  Blessed,  spoken  of  with 
bated  breath  as  the  shrines  of  the  Great  Unknowable,  but  to 
which,  as  it  is  admitted,  no  conceivable  route  can  lead.  If  we 
know  things  at  all,  we  know  them  directly,  and  we  know  them 
just  as  they  are  under  the  particular  conditions  under  which 
they  are  known.  The  relativity  of  human  knowledge  is  not  a 
thing  to  play  with.  Both  things  and  the  conditions  under 
which  they  are  known  are  open  to  investigation.  Science  is 
not  rendered  impossible  by  the  truth  that  both  things  and 
conditions  change.  This  has  been  so  abundantly  proved  by  the 
actual  progress  of  science  that  it  seems  scarcely  worth  while 
to  discuss  the  matter.  And  it  is  absolutely  taken  for  granted 
in  everyday  life,  where  conditions  and  the  change  in  conditions 
are  allowed  for  with  much  practical  good  sense,  and  where 
the  relativity  of  knowledge,  tacitly  accepted,  is  not  found 
to  stand  in  the  way  of  the  only  truths  men  care  to  establish. 

We  are,  then,  not  put  off  with  "mere  appearances,"  though 
it  is  with  appearances  that  we  have  to  do.  The  world  in  which 
we  find  ourselves  is  a  Cosmos,  an  orderly  system.  We  are 
at  the  very  heart  of  things,  or  as  much  so  as  it  is  conceivable 
that  we  should  be.  But  just  so  long  as  we  give  ourselves  up 
to  the  baseless  superstition  that  we  are  fed  upon  echoes  and 
shadows,  we  will  view  with  suspicion  the  best  that  man  can  do, 
and  will  long  for  a  better  country  in  which  man  has  only  to 
open  his  mouth  that  he  may  grow  fat  upon  Absolute  Knowl- 
edge without  taking  the  risks  of  those  who  for  themselves 
pluck  the  fruit  of  the  tree. 

In  the  third  place,  we  may  utter  a  note  of  solemn  warning 
against  those  who  beheve  that  they  possess  some  magic  for- 
mula which  may  transform  the  world  before  our  eyes.  The 
alchemist  is  out  of  date.  He  has  made  way  for  the  plausi- 
ble stranger  with  the  gold  brick,  whom  experience  justifies 
us  in  suspecting.  Among  those  who  have  believed  that  they 
possessed  some  secret  which  could  transmute  the  choir  of  heaven 


256  The   World  We  Live  In 

and  the  furniture  of  the  earth  into  ideas,  and  set  the  whole 
world  to  revolving  respectfully  around  man,  have  been  the 
choicest  and  noblest  spirits  of  the  race,  high-minded  men,  the 
singleness  of  whose  aim  and  the  acuteness  of  whose  intelU- 
gence  we  lesser  men  will  do  well  always  to  revere.  But  we 
may  love  them  while  refusing  to  follow  them.  They  may 
stand  to  us  as  a  melancholy  proof  that  it  is  possible  to  discover 
a  truth,  a  great  truth,  the  truth  that  the  only  world  given  at 
all  is  given  in  experience,  and  yet  to  be  so  carried  away  by  the 
greatness  of  this  truth  as  to  make  of  it  a  fruitful  source  of  error, 
in  spite  of  the  unmistakable  protest  of  common  sense  and  of 
science.  We  do  not  change  the  constitution  of  the  world  by 
calling  it  idea  or  will. 

The  philosopher  would  not  be  so  interesting  a  creature  as 
he  is  were  he  completely  dehumanized.  Those  of  us  who  have 
watched  the  intellectual  and  emotional  currents  which  have 
stirred  our  country  during  the  last  thirty  years  ha^^e  noticed 
how  rich  a  harvest  has  been  gathered  by  such  movements  as 
spiritism,  theosophy,  and  Christian  Science.  They  have  not 
appealed  primarily  to  philosophers ;  but,  on  the  other  hand, 
they  have  not  appealed  to  those  who  care  chiefly  for  their  three 
meals  and  for  their  station  in  society.  They  have  appealed 
to  those  who  have  a  weakness  for  short  cuts  to  a  knowledge 
of  great  subjects,  who  are  not  devoid  of  imagination,  and  who 
welcome  a  strong  stirring  of  the  emotions ;  in  some  cases,  be- 
cause they  find  this  last  decidedly  helpful  in  getting  through 
life.  It  would  be  strange,  indeed,  if  we  found  no  tendency 
at  all  analogical  to  this  in  the  field  of  philosophy. 

As  a  matter  of  fact,  we  do  find  such  a  tendency.  The  philos- 
opher who  promises  us  the  moon  and  the  stars  attracts  our 
attention.  He  interests  us,  and  we  hurry  into  the  reviews 
to  discuss  him,  even  when  we  do  not  take  his  promises  seri- 
ously. We  turn  to  look  at  the  man  who  has  raised  the  cry  of 
"  Fire  ! "  although  we  feel  sure  that  there  is  no  conflagration 


The   World  of  Sober  Earnest  257 

in  the  vicinity.  Similarly,  we  read  the  works  of  the  moralist 
who  tells  us  that  obedience  to  the  law  is  little  better  than 
bovine,  and  that  murder  and  robbery  are  the  virtues  of  the 
blond.  Is  not  what  he  says  "original"  ?  "vital"?  "suggestive"  ? 
Shall  not  philosophy  aim  at  the  complete  satisfaction  of  man  ? 
even  at  the  satisfaction  of  his  love  of  the  sensational  ?  But 
the  sober  philosopher,  who  is  absorbed  in  the  endeavor  to  get 
and  to  impart  to  others  clear  notions  of  the  constitution  of 
Everybody's  World,  feels  himself  very  much  under  objective 
control,  and  he  hesitates  to  announce  startling  discoveries 
which  he  secretly  feels  that  he  cannot  substantiate  in 
detail. 

This  brings  me  to  the  doctrine  discussed  in  the  last  chapter, 
namely,  that  the  world  is  ours  to  unmake  and  to  remake. 
That  the  pragmatists,  I  mean  the  undiluted  pragmatists, 
have  startled  men  by  raising  the  cry  of  "  Fire  !  "  I  think  there 
can  be  no  question.  Yet  the  world  does  not  burn,  as  we  all 
know.  It  is  well  for  the  philosopher  who  takes  his  duty 
seriously  to  reassure  his  neighbors  on  this  point.  As  for  the 
moderate  pragmatist,  who  supports  the  pragmatic  thesis 
that  things  burn  by  pointing  out  that  there  really  has  been 
fire,  since  some  one  indubitably  struck  a  match  to  light  his 
cigar  —  he  need  cause  Httle  uneasiness  to  our  commonplace 
Everybody.  We  have  only  to  call  attention  to  the  fact  that  it 
has  on  all  sides  been  admitted  that  men  can  and  do  strike 
matches,  as  also  to  the  fact  there  is  a  consensus  of  opinion 
touching  the  propriety  of  striking  matches  on  certain  occasions 
and  not  doing  so  on  others. 

The  philosopher  should,  then,  come  back  to  Everybody's 
World  rather  as  a  quiet  guide  than  as  a  setter  up  of  new  notions 
and  a  revolutionist.  He  should  insist  that  the  world  is  Phe- 
nomenon —  the  very  stuff  of  experience  —  but  he  should  not 
forget  to  indicate  that  we  have  had  to  do  with  this  all  along, 
and  are  really  very  well  adjusted  to  it.     He  should  be  willing 


258  The   World  We  Live  In 

to  admit  that  there  is  much  good  sense  and  dependable  informa- 
tion in  Everybody's  World.  Men  know  a  good  deal  about  the 
system  of  physical  things  and  something  about  minds.  That 
their  knowledge  is  in  certain  respects  indefinite,  and  that  re- 
flective knowledge  is  difficult  of  access  to  all,  and  impossible 
to  some,  does  not  mean  that  there  is  no  settled  knowledge,  nor 
does  it  invalidate  the  usually  accepted  methods  of  proof  and 
make  verification  a  tiling  to  scoff  at.  The  long  experience  of 
the  race  is  not  to  be  despised. 

To  be  sure,  the  old  order  is  changing.  Knowledge  begets 
knowledge ;  some  beliefs  are  discovered  to  be  erroneous ;  new 
facts  present  themselves.  But  this  phenomenon  is  not  a  new 
one,  and  has  long  been  discounted  in  advance.  The  old  order 
always  has  been  changing,  and  men  have  all  along  been  mak- 
ing new  adjustments.  The  more  quietly  they  can  do  so,  the 
better  it  seems  to  be  for  the  progress  of  science. 

All  this  the  pliilosopher  knows,  and  this  he  should  bring  to 
the  attention  of  his  fellows.  But  it  is  not  his  function  to  dwell 
unduly  upon  the  limitations  of  science.  There  is  much  that  is 
settled,  so  settled  that  it  is  wise  for  us  to  tell  those  whom  we  are 
called  upon  to  instruct  that  they  must  adjust  themselves  to  it 
under  penalty  of  perishing  miserably.  And  that  which  we 
seem  under  obligation  to  accept  as  settled  does  not  necessarily 
depend  for  its  truth  upon  what  is  as  yet  uncertain.  When  we 
are  in  a  mood  to  degrade  science  and  exalt  philosophy,  we  are 
apt  to  point  out  that  Httle  is  known  of  remote  regions  in  space, 
of  the  distant  past  and  future  of  our  world,  of  the  intimate  con- 
stitution of  matter.  Yet  our  ignorance  in  these  fields  in  no- 
wise affects  a  multitude  of  other  things  which  we  know,  and 
which  it  is  of  the  utmost  importance  for  us  to  know.  More- 
over, if  we  ever  do  extend  our  knowledge  in  these  fields,  it  will 
be  by  frankly  accepting  and  using  as  a  basis  the  information 
which  we  have  so  far  had  the  good  fortune  to  acquire.  It  will 
not  be  by  looking  forward  and  refusing  to  take  into  considera- 


The   World  of  Sober  Earliest  259 

tion  the  experience  which  Hes  behind.  In  science,  the  admoni- 
tion to  look  forward  must  be  most  carefully  guarded. 

From  the  injurious  superstition  touching  what,  by  the 
irony  of  fate,  have  come  to  be  called  Ultimate  Truths,  it  is 
time  that  both  those  who  inhabit  Everybody's  World  and  those 
who  make  excursions  beyond  its  confines  should  be  set  free. 
He  who  has  traveled  far  and  has  kept  his  eyes  open  is  not  much 
impressed  by  what  some  travelers  on  their  return  say  about 
Ultimate  Truth.  Must  the  man  of  science  apologize  to  the 
philosopher  for  believing  that  the  sun  shines  by  day  and 
the  moon  by  night  ?  that  water  seeks  its  own  level  ?  that 
arsenic  should  not  be  a  bulky  ingredient  in  foods  intended  for 
human  beings  ?  Must  he  be  ashamed  of  his  "  approximations," 
and  stand  ready  to  admit  that  no  science  capable  of  improve- 
ment may  properly  be  called  science  at  all  ?  Must  he  say : 
*'I  do  not  mean  to  be  taken  literally;  I  am  merely  speaking, 
for  convenience,  as  if  the  moon  had  another  side,  and  as  if 
a  ton  of  coal  weighed  more  than  the  mote  in  a  sunbeam"? 
He  who  is  not  bent  double  under  the  weight  of  his  own  learn- 
ing has  surely  had  it  brought  before  his  eyes  that  truths  not 
supposed  to  be  ultimate  —  the  plain  truths  recognized  by 
plain  men  and  men  of  science  —  are  often  truths  generally 
accepted,  constantly  verified,  based  upon  indubitable  proofs, 
testified  to  by  sensation's  irremediable  flow  and  by  the  coercions 
of  the  world  of  sense ;  while  the  truths  fondly  spoken  of  as  ulti- 
mate are  too  often  truths  of  such  a  complexion  that  he  who 
enunciates  them  can  scarcely  get  any  one  else  to  admit  that 
they  are  truths  at  all  or  that  what  he  urges  in  their  support 
is  properly  to  be  called  evidence. 

I  say  this,  not  with  any  intention  of  disparaging  the  philos- 
opher. I  have  spent  my  Hfe  in  philosophy,  and  I  love  it. 
But  it  is  of  no  small  importance  to  recognize  that  the  philos- 
opher is  not  a  being  whom  we  should  put  in  a  niche  and  before 
whom  we  should  light  a  lamp.     He  is  a  man  whose  duty  it  is  to 


2  6o  The   World  We  Live  In 

get  a  clearer  and  more  comprehending  view  of  Everybody's 
World  ;  a  man  with  a  difficult  task  before  him ;  a  man  peculiarly 
liable  to  the  error  of  confusing  what  he  sees  with  what  he  merely 
imagines.  He  should  speak  with  diffidence,  and  when  the  bold 
features  of  Everybody's  World  plainly  give  the  lie  to  his  utter- 
ances, he  should  be  wilhng  to  withdraw  them.  Of  that  world 
he  may  not  speak  with  contempt.  Were  it  not  there,  he  would 
be  deprived  of  his  occupation. 

To  sum  up.  The  world  we  actually  Hve  in,  the  world  of  our 
experience,  is  a  world  of  sober  earnest.  It  has  no  place  for 
the  baseless  skepticism  that  will  not  recognize  truth  at  all,  nor 
for  the  childish  credulity  that  is  incapable  of  discrimination. 
It  would  unhesitatingly  eliminate  those  unwise  enough  to  carry 
into  practice  the  doctrine  that  the  men  and  things  we  daily 
meet  with  are  shadows  and  unrealities.  It  stubbornly  resists 
transformation,  however  gracefully  the  magician  may  wave  his 
wand.  It  is  too  big  to  be  bullied,  and  it  must  be  accepted,  in 
great  part,  as  it  presents  itself.  It  cannot  properly  be  said 
that  we  immake  and  remake  it  when  we  avert  our  eyes  from  one 
thing  in  it  and  turn  them  upon  another. 

There  is  a  body  of  human  knowledge  to  which  it  is  prudent 
for  us  to  adjust  ourselves.  There  are  ways  of  adding  to  human 
knowledge,  approved  by  the  experience  of  centuries,  and  cer- 
tainly not  discredited  by  anything  that  has  been  discovered  in 
our  time.  And  whether  man  is  concerned  to  make  use  of  that 
which  he  already  knows,  or  is  concerned  to  press  forward  to 
new  knowledge,  he  appears  to  live  under  the  reign  of  law.  The 
world  we  live  in  dispenses  with  sovereign  power  rewards  and 
punishments.  It  does  not  reward  ignorance,  nor  does  it  deal 
tenderly  with  the  petulance  that  refuses  to  recognize  that  it 
stands  under  authority.  Surely  a  wise  philosophy  of  life  will 
counsel  a  man  to  adjust  himself  as  cheerfully  as  he  can  to  what 
is  known,  making  the  best  of  it  for  himself  and  for  others,  and 
to  walk  through  life  with  open  eyes,  that  he  may  increase  his 
knowledge  and  not  be  overtaken  by  calamity  unawares. 


The   World  of  Sober  Emnicst  261 

The  body  of  human  knowledge  indisputably  accepted  is, 
however,  limited.  Even  the  realm  of  the  physicist  has  an  in- 
definite boundary,  where  no  man  can  walk  with  confidence. 
The  layman  into  whose  hands  falls  the  volume  published  at 
Cambridge  in  commemoration  of  the  centenary  celebration 
in  honor  of  that  great  citizen  of  Everybody's  World,  Charles 
Darwin,  is  brought  to  a  vivid  realization  of  the  fact  that 
there  is  much  dispute  in  the  sciences  which  occupy  themselves 
with  the  study  of  the  manifestations  of  Life.  Who  has  a  right 
to  dogmatize  in  the  realms  of  psychology,  aesthetics,  ethics, 
sociology,  epistemology,  metaphysics  ?  Who  is  justified  in 
laying  down  the  law  and  severely  condemning  differences  of 
opinion  in  that  fascinating  domain  assigned  to  religion  ?  To 
what  we  definitely  know  we  can  with  more  or  less  accuracy 
adjust  ourselves.  But  may  a  philosophy  of  life  embrace 
within  its  view  only  what  we  definitely  and  certainly  know  ? 
may  it  ignore  all  else  ? 

As  a  matter  of  fact,  neither  the  plain  man  nor  the  scholar 
shows  a  tendency  to  limit  himself  in  this  way.  He  reaches 
out,  as  a  rule,  to  the  Beyond;  sometimes  with  boldness;  some- 
times with  a  painful  sense  that  he  has  not  attempted  to  justify 
his  right  to  do  so;  and  sometimes  in  a  half-hearted  and  in- 
consistent way  born  of  his  lack  of  confidence.  It  is  of  this 
Beyond,  and  of  man's  adjustment  to  it,  that  I  shall  speak 
in  the  next  chapter. 


CHAPTER  XVHI 

THE  WOULD  OF  KNOWLEDGE  AND  THE  WORLD  OF  BELIEF 

When  William  James  published  his  lecture  on  the  "  Will  to 
Believe,"  that  declaration  of  the  Rights  of  Man  wliich  has 
attracted  so  much  attention  in  recent  years,  a  sigh  of  relief  was 
breathed  by  a  vast  number  of  persons  who  were  oppressed  by 
the  sense  that,  even  if  they  claimed  freedom,  they  had  no  real 
right  to  do  so.  Some  were  philosophers ;  some  were  men  who 
had  little  direct  acquaintance  with  philosophy.  The  door  to  a 
legitimate  freedom  seemed  to  be  set  open,  and  the  sweeter  air 
of  the  outer  world  tempered  at  once  the  atmosphere  of  the 
prison  house.  Some,  chiefly  philosophers,  objected  to  the 
draught  which  was  set  up,  and  at  once  entered  a  protest. 
But,  on  the  whole,  men  rejoiced,  and  men  continue  to  rejoice. 

The  fact  is,  that  the  bold  assertion  of  the  right  to  permit  faith 
to  rise  to  a  height  unattainable  by  indubitable  evidence  seemed 
to  strengthen  a  claim  very  dear  to  the  heart,  and  which  man- 
kind has  urged  from  time  immemorial.  ]\Ien  have  always 
guided  their  lives  in  accordance  with  the  principle ;  here  they 
find  themselves  justified. 

What  men  have  done,  and  what  men  do,  we  have  only  to 
open  our  eyes  to  see  for  ourselves.  In  the  gradual  evolution  of 
a  social  order  which  has  resulted  in  making  the  life  of  man 
something  different  from  the  existence  of  the  brute,  conscious 
reasoning  has  undoubtedly  played  its  part.  No  one  would 
dream  of  denying  that.  Nor,  I  suppose,  would  any  one  care  to 
deny  that  it  is  desirable  that  men  should  see  clearly,  and  should 
be  capable  of  regarding  critically  their  own  hves  and  the  social 
order  in  which    they  are   imbedded.     But   to   suppose   that 

262 


World  of  K7WZV ledge  and   World  of  Belief    26 


there  ever  has  been  a  time  in  wliich  the  social,  political, 
and  ethical  faiths  which  have  animated  men's  actions  have 
been  based  wholly  upon  marshaled  evidence,  and  have  been 
given  their  distinctive  outlines  as  a  result  of  expKcit  reasonings, 
is  to  betray  an  ignorance  of  man  that  seems  httle  excusable. 
Man  lives  first  and  thinks  afterwards ;  he  desires,  and  he  then 
becomes  partially  conscious  of  what  it  is  that  he  desires ;  he 
wills,  and  it  is  only  with  effort  that  he  attains  to  a  clear  realiza- 
tion of  what  it  is  that  he  wills.  All  is  not  in  the  foreground  of 
the  picture,  all  lines  are  not  sharp  and  hard ;  there  are  mysteri- 
ous depths  and  shadowy  outlines  which  he  feels  rather  than 
sees,  but  which  cannot  be  left  out  of  account  by  one  who  would 
appreciate  justly  the  significance  of  the  whole. 

Take  men  as  they  are.  How  many  men  are  in  a  position  to 
give  expUcit  reasons  for  the  implicitly  accepted  maxims  which 
guide  their  daily  Hves  ?  for  the  exceptions  which  they  make  in 
the  applications  of  such  ?  for  their  likes  and  disHkes  ?  for 
their  approval  of  certain  innovations  ?  for  the  instinct  which 
warns  them  that  certain  others  will  result  in  loss  and  not  in 
gain  ?  When  they  are  asked  to  justify  their  attitude,  they 
usually  adduce  reasons  which  really  have  very  httle  to  do  with 
motives  which  actually  impel  them  —  superficial  reasons, 
plausible  reasons,  reasons  which  sound  well  in  discussion,  but 
are  of  Httle  actual  sign  ficance.  The  comphcated  system  of 
forces,  the  total  outcome  of  which  is  the  social  order  which  em- 
braces us  and  supports  us,  does  not  He  wholly  in  the  fight  of  day. 
To  throw  fight  upon  it,  so  far  as  we  can,  is  a  manifest  duty ; 
to  ignore  all  that  is  not  brightly  illuminated,  and  to  reason 
consequently  upon  such  a  basis,  argues  a  keen  but  a  narrow 
and  unsympathetic  mind,  and  a  courage  not  easy  to  differen- 
tiate from  obstinacy. 

Sometimes  individuals,  ignoring  the  actual  nature  of  man 
and  the  place  which  he  now  occupies  in  the  evolution  of  things, 
suggest  the  arbitrary  conversion  of  the  City  of  this  World  into 


264  The   World  We  Live  In 

a  New  Republic,  where  inherited  prejudices  shall  be  put  away, 
and  where  pure  reason  shall  reign  supreme.  They  had  better 
legislate  for  possible  inhabitants  of  the  planet  Mars.  We  know 
little  of  such,  and  we  can  assume  that  this  airy  and  ideal  legis- 
lation may  fit  the  conditions  which  obtain  among  them.  But 
we  do  know  something  of  men,  and  we  know  that  their  future 
and  their  past  are  knit  together  in  a  way  that  cannot  be  safely 
disregarded.  Those  to  whom  is  intrusted  the  responsible  task 
of  governing  men  are  better  aware  of  this  than  are  those  who 
view  them  from  a  distance,  and  whose  immediate  dealings  are 
with  ink  and  paper.  The  fact  is  not  without  its  significance. 
And  when  a  whole  people  decides  to  forget  its  past,  and  to  con- 
struct for  itself  a  future  of  an  impossible  radiance  based  upon 
reason,  falsely  so  called,  the  result  is  something  like  anarchy. 
It  would  be  complete  anarchy  were  it  not  that  it  is  impossible 
for  man  to  forget  completely.  No  civihzation  could  survive  a 
chronic  French  Revolution  in  every  European  and  American 
state.  The  worst  of  Asiatic  despotisms  would  outdistance  us. 
Neither  the  state  nor  the  individual  can  get  on  without  what 
the  unsympathetic  call  historical  prejudices.  The  purely 
rational  anatomist  conceived  by  the  immortal  Jean  Paul  stands 
lower  than  the  savage.  The  latter  is  at  least  to  some  degree 
adjusted  to  tribal  needs  and  to  tribal  regulations.  The  former 
is  fit  only  to  be  marooned. 

It  may  be  said  that  all  this  applies  only  to  the  unreflective. 
That  the  philosopher  is  a  soul  that  dwells  apart,  and  is  above 
human  weaknesses.  Perhaps  this  prejudice  of  the  vulgar  is 
due  in  part  to  the  fact  that  the  philosopher  is  apt  to  speak  in 
such  a  way  that  few  can  understand  clearly  what  he  is  saying. 
Were  the  philosopher  really  so  independent  and  unprejudiced 
a  creature  as  we  are  sometimes  given  to  understand  that  he  is, 
the  history  of  philosophy  could  be  read  backwards  as  conven- 
iently as  it  can  be  read  forwards.  System  would  not  rise  out  of 
system  as  it  manifestly  does.     There  would  be  no  schools  in 


World  of  Knowledge  and  World  of  Belief    265 

philosophy.  That  there  are  such  cannot  be  attributed  to  the 
fact  that  a  philosopher  leaves  behind  him  a  basis  of  indubitable 
truth  upon  which  his  successor,  if  he  is  to  build  at  all,  must  per- 
force stand.  Men  of  equal  intelligence  embrace  widely  diverg- 
ing doctrines,  and  there  is  no  unquestionably  objective  con- 
trol, no  irrefutable  verification,  which  can  coerce  them  into 
agreement.  Here  again  let  us  look  at  the  actual  facts.  Why 
is  one  man  a  scholastic,  another  a  Hegelian,  a  third  a  positivist, 
a  fourth  a  Spencerian,  a  fifth  a  pragmatist?  He  knows  the 
philosophers  httle  who  supposes  that  each  is  an  impersonal 
mouthpiece  through  which  the  passionless  voice  of  reason 
communicates  to  us  its  colorless  utterances. 

That  the  philosopher  is  a  man,  and  like  other  men,  is  swayed 
by  the  impulse  to  believe  even  where  there  is  not  present  such 
evidence  as  men  generally  would  admit  to  be  scientifically 
coercive,  appears  to  be  a  patent  fact.  That  he  tries  to  be 
objective,  so  far  as  he  can,  let  us  freely  admit.  But  let  us 
recognize  that  he  is  a  man.  And  he  is,  as  a  rule,  a  man  influ- 
enced by  his  emotions,  and  in  need  of  some  satisfying  outlook 
upon  life. 

The  philosopher  has,  in  his  day,  bowed  down  to  gods  many 
and  to  lords  many.  He  is  still  to  be  found  on  his  knees  before 
a  variety  of  shrines.  Think  of  the  "  One's,"  the  "  Absolute's," 
the  "  Ultimate  Reality's,"  the  "  Unknowable's",  the  ''  Over- 
soul's,"  the  ''  Super-individual  Ego's,"  the  "  Nature's,"  the 
"  Cosmic  Will's,"  that  have  compelled  his  adoration  !  Devout 
he  has  almost  always  been,  in  his  own  way.  And  he  has  de- 
fended with  zeal  and  ingenuity  the  God  or  Pseudo-god  which  he 
beheves  himself  to  have  freely  chosen,  setting  forth,  often  with 
much  feeling.  His  nature  and  attributes,  adducing  reasons 
why  other  men  should  come  to  share  his  allegiance,  persuading 
them  to  bow  the  head  in  the  twihght  of  the  same  fane. 

When  those  who  have  not  been  schooled  by  him  in  their 
youth  come  to  examine  his  account  of  the  object  of  his  wor- 


266  The   Wot- Id  We  Live  hi 

ship,  they  are  sometimes  filled  with  admiration  of  his  specula- 
tive genius,  and  often  with  wonder  at  the  transparent  empti- 
ness of  the  Abstraction  upon  the  altar.  They  ask  themselves 
how  it  is  possible  that  a  man  of  such  clear  vision  has  found  it 
possible  to  balance  himself  upon  liis  bridge  of  a  single  hair,  and, 
nevertheless,  to  persuade  himself  that  his  feet  have  never  left 
the  solid  ground. 

All  honor  to  the  philosopher.  He  reflects,  and  men  gener- 
ally reflect  httle.  He  tries  to  be  independent,  and  he  partially 
succeeds.  We  cannot  severely  blame  him  for  lacking  an  inde- 
pendence which  appears  to  be  unbecoming  to  a  civilized  man. 
"  An  ill-favored  thing,  but  mine  own,"  said  Touchstone ; 
"  ^ot  an  ill-favored  thing,  because  mine  own,"  says,  in  effect, 
the  philosopher ;  and  he  is  in  some  danger  of  forgetting  that 
certain  of  his  colleagues  have  put  upon  the  creduHty  of  human 
nature  a  strain  at  least  equal  to  that  laid  upon  it  by  the  theo- 
logian when  at  his  worst.  Independence  may,  in  general,  be 
said  to  make  for  progress ;  but  an  irresponsible  independence, 
in  a  field  in  which  objective  control  is  not  everywhere  to  be  met 
with,  may  easily  degenerate  into  eccentricty  which  does  not  aid 
progress  at  all. 

The  philosopher  is,  then,  a  man,  even  if  a  reflective  creature. 
I  cannot  see  why  he  should  not  acknowledge  the  same  obhga- 
tions  to  society  which  are  openly  or  tacitly  admitted  by  other 
men.  "  I  stand  absolutely  alone,"  said  an  eminent  German 
artist,  who  happened  to  be  at  the  same  time  a  man  of  science 
and  much  interested  in  religious  problems  ;  ''  my  opinions  are 
wholly  independent,  and  uninfluenced  by  those  of  others." 
To  this  I  was  obliged  to  answer :  "  Such  an  independence  must 
give  an  agreeable  sense  of  freedom ;  but,  were  it  adopted  by 
men  generally,  there  would  be  no  such  thing  as  society."  Nor 
was  there  lacking  the  further  reflection  that,  if  the  words  of  the 
speaker  were  literally  true  in  a  broad  sense,  he  would  long  be- 
fore have  been  eliminated  by  society  altogether. 


World  of  Knowledge  aiid  World  of  Belief    267 

Pure  reason  can  precipitate  nothing  out  of  the  void.  May 
we  sweep  our  net  in  empty  space  to  collect  notions  of  what  is 
meant  by  justice,  by  a  fair  wage,  by  the  courtesy  which  one 
human  being  may  expect  from  another  ?  What  aberrations 
may  not  be  expected  of  those  who  would  insert  the  knife  of 
their  pitiless  logic  and  make  a  sweeping  cut  between  what  is 
and  what  ought  to  be  !  I  have  heard  an  eloquent  speaker,  at 
a  meeting  called  in  one  European  country  to  protest  against 
an  act  of  tyranny  perpetrated  in  another,  urge  upon  four  thou- 
sand of  his  countrymen  the  introduction  into  elementary  schools 
of  the  teachings  of  Schopenhauer  and  Nietzsche.  To  be  sure, 
he  thought  that,  for  the  very  young,  the  milk  of  human  kind- 
ness drawn  from  these  sources  should  be  partially  sterilized 
in  the  laboratory  of  his  own  intelligence. 

The  Will  to  Beheve  is  everywhere.  Neither  the  plain  man, 
the  man  of  science,  nor  the  philosopher  can  justly  claim  to  be 
uninfluenced  by  it.  And  its  influence  is  so  overwhelming,  so 
significant  for  human  life,  that  it  becomes  of  no  small  impor- 
tance to  ask  v/hat  checks  should  be  set  upon  it,  what  rules  of  a 
general  character,  at  least,  it  should  be  expected  to  observe. 

It  seems  the  first  duty  of  one,  revolving  in  his  mind  the  prob- 
lem of  what  it  is  wise  for  a  man  to  believe,  tentatively  at 
least,  in  the  broad  region  not  yet  inclosed  by  fences  of  scien- 
tific evidence  strengthened  by  measured  props  of  probable  error, 
to  bear  in  mind  that  the  present  has  grown  out  of  the  past,  and 
derives  its  significance  from  it.  One  point  is  not  enough  to 
determine  the  direction  of  motion.  The  man  too  modern  to 
recognize  that  there  is  a  road  behind  him  cannot  know  whither 
he  is  tending.  It  is  to  the  present  and  to  the  immediate  fu- 
ture that  the  mass  of  men  are  called  upon  to  adjust  themselves. 
Of  the  remote  future  we  know  too  little  to  give  it  a  serious  claim 
upon  us.  It  is  not  our  duty  to  cultivate  in  ourselves  vices  which 
may  pass  as  virtues  in  some  remote  and  highly  problematic 
age  which  may  have  little  or  nothing  in  common  with  the  age 


268  The   World  We  Live  In 

in  which  we  are  called  upon  to  live.  If  any  one  wishes  to  specu- 
late regarding  such,  let  him  speculate,  and  let  him  remember 
that  his  speculations  should  not  be  allowed  to  stand  in  the  way 
of  the  serious  bushiess  of  life  as  it  is  carried  on  in  our  time. 
This  truth  is,  I  think,  fairly  well  recognized  by  most  men  of 
sober  mind  who  occupy  themselves  with  social  and  ethical 
problems  and  are  not  concerned  to  create  a  sensation.  They 
furnish,  as  a  rule,  httle  material  of  journalistic  interest. 

Is  it  otherwise  in  religion  ?  Men  find  themselves  in  the 
presence  of  certain  historic  faiths  which  claim  the  allegiance 
of  whole  nations.  Faiths  weighted  with  the  authority  of  an 
august  past,  rich  in  the  associations  which  feed  helpful  emotion, 
provided  with  rituals  which  give  concrete  expression  and  a 
certain  stability  to  conceptions  and  ideals  which  without  some 
such  aid  seem  in  danger  of  proving  elusive  and  evanescent. 
Faiths  which  draw  man  close  to  man  in  a  common  hope,  and 
awaken  a  sympathy  in  which  many  may  have  their  share. 
They  have  grown  as  the  state  has  grown,  and  have  survived  the 
shocks  of  successive  revolutions.  They  seem  to  embody  a 
Life,  contact  with  which  has  been  prized  by  countless  multi- 
tudes, and  in  approaching  which  men  have  sought  and  found 
consolation. 

This  sphere  has  always  been  the  sphere  in  which  the  Will  to 
Believe  has  obtained  especial  recognition.  So  important  has 
it  been  deemed  that  it  has  been  urged  as  a  duty,  and  not  infre- 
quently has  been  treated  as  the  proper  subject  of  rewards  and 
penalties.  The  abuses  to  which  this  has  given  rise  are  recorded 
in  the  pages  of  history.  Such  records  one  may  read  with  mixed 
feelings.  On  the  one  hand,  they  speak  to  us  eloquently  of  the 
intolerance  of  man ;  on  the  other,  they  bring  us  to  a  vivid  con- 
sciousness of  the  fact  that  it  has  always  been  regarded  as  of  the 
utmost  importance  that  man  should  believe,  should  cherish 
hopes  and  ideals  which  seem  not  of  our  commonplace  every- 
day world,  as  also  of  the  fact  that  belief  has  been  recognized 


World  of  Knozv ledge  and   World  of  Belief    269 

to  be  partly  an  affair  of  the  will  and  not  merety  of  the  intellect. 
The  doctrine  of  the  Will  to  Believe  is  nothing  new.  In  the  time 
to  come,  the  historian  of  philosophy  will  recognize  in  what  has 
recently  attracted  so  much  attention  from  the  philosophers 
only  a  local  revival  of  interest  in  what  has  always  tacitly  been 
accepted  as  a  fact  by  men  generally,  but  has  sometimes  been 
allowed  to  slip  out  of  view  by  those  who  make  a  profession  of 
thinking. 

What  shall  be  our  attitude  towards  the  historic  faiths? 
Shall  the  Will  to  BeHeve  be  exercised  quite  independently? 
or  shall  it  be  urged  that  they  have  some  especial  claim  upon 
it? 

Men  generally  decide  the  question  much  as  they  decide  the 
question  touching  their  social  and  ethical  beliefs.  They  dis- 
trust the  whim  of  the  individual.  They  value  the  sense  of 
sohdarity.  They  think  that  what  has  come  to  be  as  a  result  of 
an  evolution  from  the  past,  has,  in  so  far,  the  prior  claim. 
Undoubtedly  this  may  result  in  the  retention  of  ancient  abuses, 
but  it  at  least  makes  for  stability  in  the  evolution  of  society. 
That  all  men  are  conservative,  no  one  could  maintain,  nor  that 
conservation  reigns  equally  in  all  places  or  in  all  ages.  It  does, 
however,  play  a  very  considerable  part  in  making  it  possible 
that  there  should  be  rehgions  and  religious  observances  to 
which  men  may  turn,  in  place  of  a  countless  swarm  of  bodiless 
opinions  bewildering  to  the  plain  man,  and  as  perplexing  even 
to  the  more  thoughtful  as  the  history  of  philosophy  is  to  the 
average  undergraduate. 

Should  men  be  conservative  in  this  field?  Why  hold  to 
ancient  superstitions  instead  of  cheerfully  accepting  new  truth, 
when  there  are  so  many  who  offer  it  freely  ?  To  this  I  append 
the  remark  that  "superstition"  is  an  abusive  epithet.  Its 
use  indicates  that  we  have  already  condemned  the  belief  to 
which  we  apply  the  name.  But  I  shall  not  quarrel  with  the 
word.     I  shall  merely  point  out  that  prudent  men,  even  when 


270  The   World  We  Live  In 

rather  imreflective,  are  not  without  some  justification  in  their 
instinctive  distrust  of  what  are  called  new  superstitions.  There 
are  those  to  whom  mere  newness  is  a  recommendation  —  who 
like  the  stimulus  of  novelty,  who  take  pleasure  in  the  thought 
that  they  are  in  all  respects  abreast  of  the  times. 

But  the  more  reflective  and  the  more  cautious  remark  that 
there  is  apt  to  be  something  crude  and  acrid  about  a  new  super- 
stition. The  intemperate  enthusiasm  of  its  votaries  has  not 
yet  been  moderated  by  the  realization  of  the  fact  that  beliefs 
must  adjust  themselves,  under  penalties,  to  the  demands  of 
experience.  We  are  supposed  to  be  in  the  realm  of  the  "Be- 
yond," to  be  discussing  beliefs  lying  beyond  the  borders  of 
science  in  the  strict  sense  of  the  word,  and  where  evidence  is 
not  a  thing  to  be  measured  and  accurately  estimated.  Mani- 
festly, if  such  beHefs  trespass  upon  the  domain  of  science,  and 
deny  that  for  which  we  have  palpable  evidence,  they  must  un- 
dergo transformation  or  cease  to  be.  As  a  rule,  they  do  undergo 
transformation.  What  is  realized  to  be  harmful  is  eliminated, 
or  is  given  but  a  formal  recognition  and  is  deprived  of  its  power 
to  do  hurt.  What  is  found  to  be  helpful  and  stimulating  is 
given  emphasis.  The  implicit  reason  of  the  race  justifies 
itself  Vvdth  the  progress  of  time.  The  sharp  and  jagged  edges 
of  the  newly  broken  fragment  of  quartz,  subjected  to  the  attri- 
tion of  the  passing  hours,  are  worn  away,  and  the  smooth  round 
pebble  no  longer  wounds  our  fingers. 

It  has  been  well  pointed  out  that  what  present  themselves  as 
new  truths  recommend  themselves  to  us,  aside  from  the  ques- 
tion of  the  quantity  and  quality  of  the  objective  evidence  upon 
which  they  appear  to  rest,  in  proportion  to  the  insignificance 
of  the  derangement  which  they  occasion  to  common  sense  and 
previous  belief,  and  to  the  feebleness  of  the  "jolt"  to  which 
they  subject  us.  In  fields  in  which  the  evidence  submitted  is 
indisputable  and  susceptible  of  rather  accurate  measurement, 
the  question  whether  the  new  or  the  old  shall  triumph  seems  to 


World  of  Knowledge  and  World  of  Belief    271 

be  no  more  than  a  trial  of  strength  between  two  bodies  of  evi- 
dence. The  old  is  admitted  to  have  weight,  not  because  we 
happen  to  be  adjusted  to  it,  but  because  it  can  be  shown  to  be 
proven  in  certain  definite  ways.  Many  a  man  has  been  com- 
pelled to  recognize  truth  that  has  "jolted"  him  intolerably; 
that  has,  indeed,  deranged  his  previous  behefs  in  such  a  way  as 
to  render  necessary  his  seclusion  and  retirement  from  an  active 
participation  in  the  affairs  of  men. 

But,  in  the  field  of  which  we  are  speaking,  the  matter  of  the 
"jolt,"  in  itself  considered,  seems  to  take  on  a  somewhat  differ- 
ent complexion.  The  Will  to  BeHeve  does  not  stand  alone  and 
supreme.  It  is  the  handmaid  of  the  Will  to  Live.  Faith 
soars,  not  aimlessly,  but  that  it  may  catch  ghmpses  of  some 
light  which  may  serve  to  guide  the  weary  and  faltermg  steps 
of  Life.  Men  generally  do  not  feel  that  they  live  most  satis- 
factorily when  they  rise  up  and  lie  down  with  arms  in  their 
hands.  He  who  must  hold  himself  ready  to  embrace  a  new 
faith  every  day  is  as  little  fitted  to  adjust  his  Hfe  to  any  faith 
as  is  the  man  who  expects  hourly  the  attack  of  the  enemy  to 
devote  himself  to  the  arts  of  peace. 

It  seems,  then,  that  something  can  be  said  for  the  man  of 
conservative  instincts,  who  distrusts  revolutionary  innova- 
tions, and  whose  impulse  is  to  accommodate  himself,  more  or 
less,  to  what  is.  To  be  sure,  if  peace  be  his  only  object,  he 
runs  the  risk  of  accommodating  himself  to  what  has  wholly 
outlived  its  usefulness,  to  what  is  dead  or  moribund.  In  that 
case,  he  will  seek  out  the  garden  of  the  sluggard,  and  will 
stretch  himself  in  a  sunny  spot  on  a  bed  of  weeds.  But  there 
is  no  principle  which  may  not  be  misapplied  by  those  disposed 
to  pervert  it ;  and  it  is  worthy  of  remark  that  those  who  have 
recently  disturbed  our  philosophic  calm  by  a  clamorous  insist- 
ence upon  the  rights  of  the  Will  to  Believe  have  not  been 
sluggards  at  all,  but  very  restless  fellows,  who  would  keep  open 
the  eyes  of  the  most  somnolent  in  their  vicinity. 


272  The   World  We  Live  In 

It  will  be  observed  that  I  have  above  spoken  generally.     I 
have  said  nothing  to  indicate  that  what  are  now  old  behefs 
were  not  once  new  and  that  it  was  not  the  duty  of  the  prudent 
man  to  weigh  them  carefully  before  accepting  them,     I  have 
not  meant  to  insist  that  all  of  those  systems  of  behef  and  prac- 
tice which  have  succeeded  in  holding  the  allegiance  of  great 
masses  of  men  stand  upon  the  same  level,  nor  that  it  may  not 
be  the  duty  of  those  capable  of  critical  reflection  to  pass  some- 
times from  one  to  another.     I  have  not  intended  to  maintain 
that  he  who  exercises  the  Will  to  BeHeve  must  forswear  the 
right  to  give  reasons  for  his  behef  and  to  point  out  that  one 
belief  may  be  more  reasonable  than  another.     Nor  should  it 
be  supposed  that  I  desire  to  put  all  men  upon  the  same  level  — 
the  strong  and  the  weak,  the  intellectual  and  the  uncritical, 
the  learned  and  the  ignorant.     It  is  not  to  be  expected  that  a 
man  of  broad  information  and  vigorous  understanding  will 
hold,  even  toward  a  system  of  behef  and  practice  from  which 
he  regards  it  as  wrong  to  cut  liimself  off,  and  which  he  sincerely 
values,  just  the  same  attitude  as  that  taken  by  men  whose 
guide   is   instinct   unenhghtened   by   criticism.     If,    on    that 
account,  men  see  fit  to  cast  him  out  from  among  them,  he  can 
wash  his  hands  of  the  matter.     In  our  day  it  is  not  difficult  for 
him  to  find  another  refuge,  and  he  is  not  compelled  to  walk 
quite  alone.     But  I  have  meant  to  make  it  clear  that  the  Will 
to  Believe  is  a  social  phenomenon,  and  that  even  a  being  so 
exalted  as  the  philosopher  may  not  feel  free  to  forget  that  he  is 
also  a  man.     Sometimes  he  is  in  danger  of  letting  the  fact 
escape  his  memory. 

It  is  with  rather  reluctant  feet  that  I  have  wandered  into 
the  subject  of  the  present  chapter.  The  ground  I  tread  seems 
to  belong,  of  right,  to  the  prophet.  Yet  how  could  the  excur- 
sion be  avoided  ?  How  can  one  discuss  the  World  We  Live 
In  without  recognizing  the  fact  that,  both  in  Everybody's 
World  and  in  the  World  of  the  Scholar,  there  are  dim  distances, 


World  of  Knowledge  and  World  of  Belief     273 

shadowy  outlines,  subdued  and  faintly  apprehended  radi- 
ances, which  give  soul  to  the  picture  ?  Can  such  be  left  out 
of  our  World-vision  ?  Have  they  no  significance  for  a  Philoso- 
phy of  Life  ?  I  have  said  in  the  first  chapter  of  this  book  that 
what  thoughtful  men  burn  to  attain  to  is  not  merely  clarity 
of  vision.  They  desire  a  Rule  of  Life  which  will  not  seem 
unworthy  of  confidence,  and  to  which  they  may  commit 
themselves  with  some  degree  of  consistency. 

And,  to  content  the  sober-minded,  the  Rule  of  Life  sought 
must  not  rest  upon  some  dazzling  misconception  of  the  nature 
of  the  world  as  it  is  actually  revealed  to  human  knowledge. 
Everybody's  World  must  not  be  allowed  to  drop  wholly  out  of 
sight,  and  its  features  to  be  expelled  from  our  minds.  It 
must  be  honestly  accepted,  and  its  shadows  as  well  as  its  bright 
places  frankly  recognized.  Nevertheless,  we  must  have  cour- 
age, and  must  make  the  best  of  the  World  We  Live  In.  Our 
task  appears  to  be  a  threefold  one :  to  adjust  ourselves  seri- 
ously to  what  is  definitely  known  of  reahty,  while  keeping  our 
eyes  open  to  possible  sources  of  new  light ;  to  face  life  bravely, 
giving  play  to  hope  and  confidence  in  the  Heart  of  the  World ; 
to  avoid,  in  willing  to  beheve  and  in  daring  to  hope,  the  dead- 
ening extreme  of  bigotry  and  willful  blindness. 

Is  this  threefold  task  one  which  may  successfully  be  accom- 
plished ?  I  believe  there  are  vast  numbers  of  men  and  women, 
m.any  of  whom  have  Kttle  learning  and  make  no  pretensions  to 
philosophy,  who  yet  are  accomplishing  it  with  varying  degrees 
of  success.  Their  attitude  toward  the  world,  raised  by  reflec- 
tion to  the  dignity  of  a  philosophy  of  life,  may  be  described  as 
a  sober  philosophy,  which  regards  the  body  of  human  knowl- 
edge as  too  weighty  a  thing  to  be  blowm  hither  and  thither  by 
every  gust  of  speculation ;  a  serious  philosophy,  to  which  the 
problem  of  the  nature  of  the  world  is  something  more  than  a 
matter  of  intellectual  curiosity ;  a  tolerant  philosophy,  which, 
possessing  no  magic  formula  of  its  own  and  looking  for  none 

T 


2  74  '^f^^   World  We  Live  In 

from  others,  speaks  without  dogmatism  and  holds  its  conclu- 
sions tentatively. 

It  is  not  every  one,  as  was  pointed  out  in  the  opening  chap- 
ter of  the  book,  to  whom  such  a  philosophy  appeals.  I  offer 
it  to  those  only  who  care  to  accept  it,  and  can  make  some  use 
of  it.  He  who  wishes  to  try  his  wings  may  reject  the  staff 
which  I,  with  some  hesitation,  hold  out  to  those  who  prefer 
walking. 


NOTES 

Chapter  I 

1  See  the  admirable  discussion  of  "Naive  Realism,"  by  Professor  Dickinson  S. 
Miller,  in  "Essays  Philosophical  and  Psychological  in  tlonor  of  William  James," 
London,  1890. 

Chapter  II 

1  For  Plato's  theory  of  sense-perception  see  Siebeck,  "  Geschichte  der  Psy- 
chologic," Gotha,  1880,  Ed.  I,  2,  S.  20S-22S. 

2  Siebeck,  Ibid.,  Bd.  II,  i,  2. 

3  Aristotle's  "Metaphysics,"  III,  5,  6. 

*  For  the  epistemology  of  the  Stoics  see  Zeller,  "The  Philosophy  of  the  Greeks." 

^  Zeller,  Ibid.,  on  the  epistemology  of  the  Epicureans. 

^See  Diogenes  Laertius,  " Pyrrho " ;  Professor  Raoul  Richter's  "Der  Skepti- 
zismus  in  der  Philosophic,"  Volume  I,  Leipzig,  1904,  contains  an  extended  and 
interesting  exposition  and  criticism  of  the  Greek  skepticism.  I  must  confess 
that  I  cannot  give  the  Skeptics  credit  for  so  much  consistency  as  does  the  author. 
See  Zeller,  "The  Philosophy  of  the  Greeks,"  under  "Pyrrho  and  the  New  Acad- 
emy." 

^  "Soliloquia,"  II,  i ;  "De  Trinitate,"  X,  5,6,  13-16;  "De  Civitate  Dei,"  XI, 
26;  XIX,  18. 

^  Siebeck,  "Geschichte  der  Psychologic,"  II,  iv,  2. 

9  For  Occam's  position  see  Baeumker,  "Allgemeine  Geschichte  der  Philoso- 
phic," "Kultur  der  Gegenwart,"  ed.  Hinneberg,  Teil  I,  Abteilung  5,  S.  369; 
Siebeck,  "Occams  Erkenntnisslehre  in  ihrer  historischen  Stellung."  "Archiv 
fiir  Geschichte  der  Philosophic,"  Bd.  X,  S.  322;  Stockl,  "Geschichte  der 
Philosophie  des  Mittelalters,"  II,  S.  994. 

1"  "Libri  Sententiarum  Questio  Prima." 

"  Descartes,  "Discourse  on  Method,"  IV;  "Meditations,"  VI. 

12  Locke,  "Essay,"  Book  I. 

"  Descartes,  "Meditations,"  III ;  Locke,  "Essay,"  Book  IV,  Chapter  XL 

"See  Zeller  on  the  Atomistic  Doctrine,  "The  Philosophy  of  the  Greeks," 
under  "The  Pre-Socratic  Philosophy,"  Part  II;  cf.  Locke,  "Essay,"  Book  II, 
Chapter  VIII. 

Chapter  III 

»See  Zeller,  "The  Philosophy  of  the  Greeks,"  under  "Plato  and  the  Old 
Academy."     Zeller  emphasizes  the  fact  that  the  Platonic  Ideas  are  in  no  sense 

275 


276  The   World  We  Live  In 

psychical.  See  also  Windelband,  "History  of  Philosophy,"  Part  I,  Chapter 
III,  §  II  :  "The  Platonic  conception  of  immateriality  is  in  nowise  coincident 
with  that  of  the  spiritual  or  psychical,  as  might  easily  be  assumed  from  the 
modern  mode  of  thinking."     (Eng.  trans..  New  York,  1901.) 

2  "Essay,"  Book  I,  Chapter  I,  §  8. 

^  "A  Treatise  concerning  the  Principles  of  Human  Knowledge,"  §  4. 

*  Ibid.,  §  6. 

s  Ibid.,  §§  28-33. 

^  "An  Essay  towards  a  New  Theory  of  Vision." 

^  "Dialogues  between  Hylas  and  Philonous,"  III,  at  end. 

8  Ibid.,  II. 

3  "Principles,"  §§  25-32. 
"Ibid.,  §141. 

Chapter  IV 

^  "Principles  of  Human  Knowledge,"  §§  3-4. 

2  Ibid.,  §§  45-48. 

^  Ibid.,  §  94. 

'  Ibid.,  §  3. 

^"An  Examination  of  Sir  William  Hamilton's  Philosophy,"  Chapter  XI. 

^  "A  System  of  Logic,"  Book  I,  Chapter  III. 

^  Professor  Mach's  views  have  been  so  much  discussed  that  it  seems  scarcely 
worth  while  to  give  references.  The  reader  will  find  a  good  brief  account  of 
them  in  The  Philosophical  Review  XIV,  5. 

*  "The  Grammar  of  Science,"  second  edition,  Chapter  II,  §§  11-12. 

^  The  most  earnest  of  realists  should  admit  that  it  is  unfair  to  include  all  who 
enroll  themselves  as  idealists  under  the  ban  of  one  co:nmon  condemnation. 
The  realist  is  compelled  to  concede  that  some  of  those  v.-riting  at  the  present 
day  appear  to  be  as  anxious  to  recognize  an  objective  order  of  things  as  he  is 
himself.  He  may  claim  that  a  certain  habit  of  thought  and  speech,  due  to  the 
influence  of  the  idealistic  tradition  with  which  they  have  not  broken,  seems  to 
add  to  the  difficulty  of  treating  the  objective  as  sharply  and  unequivocally  such. 
But  confuse  such  objective  idealists  with  writers  like  Mach  and  Pearson  he  may 
not.  To  me  some  of  them  appear  to  be  on  the  highroad  to  a  sober  realism. 
Compare,  for  example,  with  the  authors  above  criticized,  such  writers  as  Bos- 
anquet,  Albee,  Creighton,  and  Bakewell.  The  title  which  a  man  accepts  should 
not  blind  our  eyes  to  what  he  means  to  say. 

Chapter  V 

1  Hume,  "Treatise,"  Book  I,  Part  IV,  §  2  ;  "Enquiry,"  §  XII. 

^  This  was  Kant's  case.  The  "Critique  of  Pure  Reason"  appeared  in  1781; 
Garve's  criticism  in  1782  ;  Kant's  rejoinder,  the  "Prolegomena  to  Every  Future 
Metaphysic,"  in  1783;  and  the  second  edition  of  the  "Critique"  in  1787. 


Notes 


// 


^  "  Kritik  der  reinen  Vernunft,"  "  Allgemeine  Anmerkungen  zur  transscendalen 
Aesthetik,"  ed.  Hartenstein,  Leipzig,  1867,  Rd.  Ill,  S.  78-79.  All  German 
references  to  follow  are  to  this  edition  of  Kant's  works.  For  the  convenience 
of  the  English  reader  I  shall  give  references  also  to  Aleiklejohn's  translation  of 
the  "Critique"  (London,  George  Bell  and  Sons),  which  is  likely  to  be  within 
reach  of  all.  Thus  :  "  Critique,"  "  General  Remarks  on  Transcendental  .Esthet- 
ics," III,  p.  42.  It  is  scarcely  necessary  to  say  that  I  have  everywhere  made 
my  own  translations,  and  am  alone  responsible  for  the  expressions  used. 

^  "Prolegomena  zu  einer  jeden  Kiinftigen  Metaphysik,"  Anhang,  Harten- 
stein, Bd.  IV,  S.  122.  For  the  convenience  of  the  English  reader  I  give  refer- 
ences also  to  E.  Belfort  Bax's  translation  of  the  "Prolegomena"  (London, 
George  BeU  and  Sons),  Bax,  Appendix,  p.  124. 

6  Ibid. 

^  Ibid.,  S.  122-123;  Bax,  p.  125. 

'Ibid.,  S.  123;  Bax,  p.  125.  I  have  rendered  " schwarmerisch "  by  the  use 
of  the  word  "extravagant."  Earlier  in  the  same  work  Kant  characterizes 
Berkeley's  doctrine  as  "mystisch  und  schwarmerisch"  (see  S.  41;  Bax,  p.  40). 
Another  of  Kant's  expressions  for  his  own  doctrine  is  "  transcendental  idealism  " ; 
see  the  "  Critique,"  under  "  The  Antinomy  of  Pure  Reason,"  the  section  entitled : 
"Transcendental  Idealism  as  the  Key  to  the  Solution  of  the  Cosmological 
Dialectic." 

*  Among  these  we  may  class  those  who  insist  upon  treating  the  first  edition 
as  authoritative,  and  who  republish  it  as  a  text  or  make  from  it  their  transla- 
tions. 

^"Prolegomena,"  Theil,  I,  §  13,  Anmerkung,  III ;  Hartenstein,  IV,  S.  42; 
Bax,  p.  40.     Ibid.,  Anhang,  S.  123;  Bax,  pp.  124-125. 

1"  See  the  footnote  in  Kant's  Preface  to  the  second  edition  of  the  "Critique," 
in  which  the  author  tries  to  make  it  clear  that  his  "Refutation  of  Idealism" 
really  is  what  the  title  indicates. 

11  "Critique,"  first  edition,  "  Deduction  of  the  Pure  Concepts  of  the  Under- 
standing," Part  II;  Hartenstein,  III,  S.  567. 

12  Ibid.,  S.  573. 

13  "Prolegomena,"  Anhang,  S.  123;  Bax,  pp.  124-125. 

Chapter  VI 

1  "Prolegomena,"  I,  13,  Anmerkung  II ;  Hartenstein,  IV,  S.  37-38;  Bax,  pp. 
35-36.  Kant  refers  to  Locke's  making  the  secondary  qualities  of  bodies  sub- 
jective, and  says  that  he  affirms  the  same  of  the  primary,  without,  on  that 
account,  denying  the  existence  of  the  thing. 

-  It  seems  almost  a  v.-aste  of  time  to  try  to  prove  that  Kant  did  not  discard 
the  "thing-in-itself,"  but  really  supposed  it  to  be  of  some  positive  significance. 
The  opening  sentences  of  the  "Critique  of  Pure  Reason,"  sentences  which 
appear  both  in  the  earlier  and  in  the  later  editions  of  that  work,  and  are  supported 


278  The   World  We  Live  hi 

by  the  doctrine  of  the  "Prolegomena"  (see  the  preceding  note),  are  quite  char- 
acteristic: "In  whatever  way  and  by  whatever  means  knowledge  may  refer 
to  objects,  nevertheless,  that  through  which  it  is  directly  related  to  them,  and 
upon  which  all  thinking  must  ultimately  rest,  is  intuition.  But  an  intuition 
can  only  exist  in  so  far  as  the  object  is  given  to  us ;  and  this,  again,  is,  in  the 
case  of  human  beings,  at  least,  only  made  possible  by  the  object's  affecting  the 
mind  in  a  certain  manner.  The  capacity  for  getting  presentations  through  the 
mode  in  which  we  are  affected  by  objects  is  called  the  faculty  of  sense.  Hence, 
it  is  through  our  faculty  of  sense  that  objects  are  given  us,  and  that  faculty 
alone  furnishes  us  with  intuitions.  These  intuitions  are  thought  by  means  of 
the  understanding,  which  faculty  is  the  source  of  conceptions." 

The  situation  which  Kant  here  tries  to  bring  before  us  he  endeavors  to  make 
still  more  clear  in  the  recapitulation  given  in  his  "  General  Remarks  on  Tran- 
scendental /Esthetics"  :  "We  have  meant,  then,  to  say,  that  all  our  intuition  is 
nothing  else  than  the  presentation  of  phenomena;  that  the  things  given  in 
intuition  are  not  in  themselves  constituted  as  thej^  appear  to  us,  nor  are  their 
relations  in  themselves  of  such  a  nature  as  they  seem  to  us  to  be.  Furthermore 
that  if  we  abstract  the  subject,  or  even  the  subjective  constitution  of  the  senses, 
the  whole  constitution  of  objects  in  space  and  time,  all  their  relations,  nay, 
space  and  time  themselves,  would  disappear.  These  things,  as  phenomena, 
cannot  have  an  independent  existence,  but  must  exist  merely  in  us.  How  it  may 
be  with  the  objects  in  themselves,  and  abstracted  from  all  this  receptivity  of 
our  faculty  of  sense,  remains  quite  unkno\A'n  to  us.  We  know  nothing  but  our 
wa}^  of  perceiving  them,  which  is  peculiar  to  us,  and  must  belong  to  every  human 
being,  though  not  necessarily  to  every  creature.  With  this  alone  do  we  have  to 
do."     Hartenstein,  III,  S.  72 ;  Meiklejohn,  pp.  35-36. 

'  See,  for  example,  what  Kant  has  to  say  about  the  noumenon  taken  in  the 
negative  sense :  "On  the  Ground  of  the  Division  of  all  Objects  into  Phenomena 
and  Noumena,"  Hartenstein,  III,  S.  219-222;  Meiklejohn,  pp.  185-188. 

^  See  the  definition  of  "body"  given  in  the  citation  adduced  just  above  in  the 
text  of  Chapter  VI. 

^  See  the  Preface  to  the  second  edition  of  the  "Critique,"  where  it  is  insisted 
that  the  word  "object"  may  be  taken  in  two  senses:  first,  as  standing  for  a 
phenomenon;  second,  as  indicating  a  thing-in-itself.  It  is  held  that  the  object 
as  thing-in-itself  cannot  be  hio'j.'n,  although  it  may  be  thought.  Compare 
"Prolegomena,"  III,  §  52,  c;  Hartenstein,  IV,  S.  89-90;  Bax,  p.  90. 

«  "Prolegomena,"  II,  §  14;  Hartenstein,  IV,  S.  66-68;  Bax,  pp.  68-70. 

^"Critique."     See  the  discussion  referred  to  in  note  3  (above). 

^"Kritik,"  "Der  transscendentale  Idealismus,  als  der  Schlussel  zur  Auflosung 
der  kosmologischen  Dialektik";  Hartenstein,  III,   S.  346-347;   Meiklejohn, 

P-  307- 

'  Ibid.,  S.  347;  Meiklejohn,  p.  307. 
10  Ibid.,  S.  348;  Meiklejohn,  p.  308. 
u  "  Prolegomena,"  Anhang,  Hartenstein,  IV,  S.  122-123;  Bax,  pp.  125-126. 


Notes  279 


^  See,  for  Berkeley's  doctrine  of  "real"  things,  what  has  been  said  in  Chapter 
III. 

"  "Critique."     See  Note  III  in  Kant's  "Refutation  of  Idealism." 

"  Ibid.  See  the  paragraphs  immediately  preceding  the  "  Refutation  of  Ideal- 
ism" incorporated  in  the  second  edition ;  the  paragraphs  in  question  a,ppear  in 
both  editions. 

15  "Prolegomena,"  III,  §  49;  Hartenstein,  S.  84-85;  Bax,  p.  85.  j 

"  "Kritik,"  Hartenstein,  III,  S.  198;  Meiklejohn,  p.  167. 

"  Ibid. 

Chapter  VII 

1  "Kritik,"  "Allgemeine  Anmerkungen  zur  transscendentalen  Aesthetik," 
Hartenstein,  III,  S.  73-74;  Meiklejohn,  pp.  35  ff.  In  these  "General  Remarks 
on  Transcendental  ^Esthetics"  Kant  makes  it  very  clear  that  all  significant  dis- 
tinctions fall  within  the  limits  of  the  phenomenal  world. 

2  "Principles,"  §§  33-36. 

Chapter  VIII 

'The  term  "Monism"  cries  aloud  for  accurate  definition.  If  the  man  who 
uses  it  only  means  that  the  world  is  "somehow"  one,  he  tells  us  nothing  of  his 
doctrine.     The  only  question  that  can  interest  us  is:  One,  in  what  sense? 

2  The  term  "Pluralism"  stands  in  equal  need  of  definition,  if  it  is  to  have  any 
value  in  distinguishing  between  philosophers.  In  one  sense  of  the  word,  every 
man  must  be  a  pluralist,  if  he  utters  an  intelligible  sentence ;  in  another,  no  man 
can  be  pluralist,  not  even  the  proprietor  of  the  "Hotel  de  I'Univers  et  de 
Geneve." 

'See  the  chapter  entitled  "The  Distribution  of  Minds,"  in  my  "System  of 
Metaphysics."  Also  my  papers  on  "The  Doctrine  of  the  Eject,"  in  the  Journal 
oj Philosophy,  Psychology ,  mid  Scientific  Methods,  Volume  IV,  Nos.  19,  21,  and  23. 

*  See  my  paper:  "In  What  Sense  Two  Persons  perceive  the  Same  Thing," 
Philosophical  Rcvieiv,  Volume  XVI,  No.  5. 

5  "Critique,"  "Transcendental  Esthetics,"  near  the  close  of  the  discussion 
of  Space.     Hartenstein,  III,  S.  62;  Meiklejohn,  p.  26. 

6  Ibid. 

^Ibid.,  §  6,  Hartenstein,  S.  68;  Meiklejohn,  p.  31. 

^  Ibid.,  §  8,  Hartenstein,  S.  72 ;  Meiklejohn,  p.  36. 

^  See,  in  the  "  Critique,"  "  General  Remarks  on  Transcendental  Esthetics," 
IV,  and  "On  the  Ground  of  the  Division  of  all  Objects  in  general  into  Phenomena 
and  Noutnena,"  near  the  end.  Hartenstein,  III,  S.  79,  221 ;  Meiklejohn,  pp.  43, 
186-187. 

1°  See  my  paper:  "The  Influence  of  Darwin  on  the  Mental  and  Moral 
Sciences,"  in  Proceedings  of  the  American  Philosophical  Society,  Volume 
XL  VIII. 


28o  The   World  We  Live  In 

Chapter  IX 

1  See,  for  an  extended  discussion  of  the  relation  of  mind  and  body,  my  "Sys- 
tem of  Metaphysics,"  Chapters  XVII-XXIV,  and  my  "Introduction  to  Philos- 
ophy," Chapter  IX. 

2  See  the  article:  "Is  the  Mind  in  the  Body?"  in  the  Poptdar  Science 
Monthly,  May,  1907. 

'  That  we  are  not  concerned  with  the  question  of  truth  or  falsity,  when  we 
contrast  the  experience  of  the  world  enjoyed  by  one  creature  with  that  enjoyed 
by  another,  is  admirably  brought  out  by  Count  von  Keyserling  in  his 
"Prolegomena  zur  Naturphilosophie,"  Miinchen,  1910. 

^  Representative  knowledge  is  recognized  as  a  fact,  as,  indeed,  it  must  be, 
both  by  the  plain  man  and  by  the  scholar.  The  philosopher  is  under  no  obliga- 
tion to  assume  that,  whenever  we  use  the  expression,  we  mean  to  indicate  that 
"ideas"  represent  a  something  by  hypothesis  so  cut  off  from  them  that  it  be- 
comes inconceivable  that  it  should  be  "represented"  in  any  intelligible  sense  of 
the  word.  The  analysis  of  representative  knowledge  has  been  undertaken, 
naturally,  in  somewhat  different  ways  by  different  writers.  Compare,  for  ex- 
ample. Professor  James's  "A  World  of  Pure  Experience,"  in  the  Journal  of 
Philosophy,  Psychology  and  Scientific  Methods,  Volume  I,  Nos.  20  and  21, 
with  chapters  I-III  in  Part  III  of  Professor  Hobhouse's  "Theory  of  Knowl- 
edge." 

Chapter  X 

1  Locke,  "Essay,"  Book  II,  Chapter  VIII,  §  17. 

Chapter  XI 

1  See  Chapter  IX. 

2  See  the  accounts  of  this  philosophic  survival  in  Green's  "  Prolegomena  to 
Ethics." 

' "  Essays  Philosophical   and   Psychological  in  Honor  of  William  James," 

P-  173- 

*  Ibid.,  p.  169. 

Chapter  XII 

'  In  justification  of  this  judgment  I  must  refer  the  reader  to  my  two  works : 
"The  Philosophy  of  Spinoza,"  New  York,  1894, and  "On  Spinozistic  Immortal- 
ity," Philadelphia,  1899. 

^  For  a  detailed  discussion  of  Clifford's  positions  see  my  "System  of  Meta- 
physics," pp.  298  ff.,  307-312,  325  ff.,  382-383,  438-440,  514-517- 

'"Essays  Philosophical  and  Psychological  in  Honor  of  William  James," 
London,  1908,  "  Substitutionalism,"  by  C.  A.  Strong,  p.  173. 

*  Ibid.,  p.  169. 


Notes  281 

^  My  own  position  touching  the  relation  of  mind  and  body  I  have  set  forth  at 
length  in  my  "System  of  Metaphysics,"  Chapters  XXIV,  XXXI,  and  XXXII; 
and  in  my  "Introduction  to  Philosophy,"  Chapter  IX. 

^It  should  be  noted  that,  if  the  panpsychist  does  not  make  the  external 
world  idea  or  percept,  but  at;cepts  a  world  really  external,  only  insisting  that  all 
matter  is  animated,  I  should  have  no  quarrel  with  him  save  in  his  extension  of 
the  distribution  of  minds.  But  such  a  doctrine  can  scarcely,  I  think,  be  called 
panpsychism,  since  it  adraits  an  external  world  that  is  not  psychical. 

'W.  Wundt,  "System  der  Philosophie,"  i^^  Auflage,  Leipzig,  1907,  Bd.  I, 
S.  27-34,  87-92. 

8Ibid.,S.  31,89,  370  ff. 

9  Ibid.,  S.  115. 

10  Ibid.,  S.  325. 

"  Ibid.,  S.  382-393- 

>2  Ibid.,  S.  391-393- 

"  Ibid.,  S.  376-382. 

"  Ibid.,  S.  402-406. 

'» Ibid.,  S.  434-436. 

16  Ibid.,  S.  376-382. 

1'  Ibid.,  S.  434-436. 

18  Those  curious  to  trace  the  history  of  the  gradual  sublimation  of  the  mind 
into  that  transcendental  shade  "apperception"  may  be  interested  in  the  dis- 
cussion of  the  subject  in  Chapter  V  of  my  "  System  of  ISIetaphysics." 

"  Wundt,  "System,"  I,  S.  433-434.  It  is  just  to  bear  in  mind  that  Wundt's 
"System  of  Philosophy"  is  in  no  sense  the  product  of  his  ripe  and  scholarly  old 
age.  It  was  adopted  in  his  youth,  and  has  since  imdergone  little  change.  See 
the  Preface  to  the  first  edition,  Leipzig,  1889,  and  compare  that  edition  with 
the  third,  issued  in  1907. 

Chapter  XIII 

1  Bradley,  "Appearance  and  ReaUty,"  second  edition,  London,  1897,  Intro- 
duction, p.  5.  I  take  Mr.  Bradley's  doctrine  as  it  is  presented  in  this  volume. 
It  does  not  appear  to  me  that  he  has  made  any  significant  modifications  of  it  in 
the  articles  which  have  since  been  written  by  him.  The  book  is,  moreover, 
within  the  reach  of  everyone,  whereas  scattered  papers,  which  might  here  and 
there  have  been  cited  in  place  of  the  book,  are  not  so  easy  to  come  at. 

'^  Ibid.,  pp.  5-6. 

3  Mr.  Bradley  cannot,  I  think,  object  to  my  changing  somewhat  the  order  of 
the  material  presented  in  his  book.  He  states  that  he  has  himself  followed  no 
rule  of  progress  (p.  135),  and  that  the  order  of  the  book  seemed  to  him  a  matter 
of  no  great  importance  (Appendix,  p.  553). 

*  Ibid.,  Chapter  XIV,  p.  144- 

s  Chapter  XXII,  p.  275. 

«Ibid.,  pp.  275  ff. 


282  The   World  We  Live  In 

^Chapter  XXII,  pp.  273  fE.;  XXIII,  pp.  305-307. 

8  Chapter  XXII,  pp.  284-285. 

9  Chapters  II  and  III. 

"  Chapters  IV  and  XVIII. 

"  Chapters  V  and  VI. 

12  Chapter  VII. 

"  Chapter  VIII. 

"  Chapter  IX,  p.  75. 

^5  Chapter  XXIII,  pp.  305-307. 

16  Chapter  XXIV,  pp.  362-363. 

1'  Chapter  XXII,  pp.  279,  267,  and  283. 

1'  Berkeley,  "Principles,"  §§  109,  146. 

"  "Appearance  and  Reality,"  Chapter  XIV,  p.  145  :  "...  a  vicious  abstrac- 
tion whose  existence  is  meaningless  nonsense,  and  is  therefore  not  possible." 

20  Chapters  IX,  p.  122;  XIV,  p.  157;  XXV,  pp.  422-423,  448-449;  e^ 
passim. 

^1  Chapter  X,  p.  132,  et  passim. 

22  Chapters  XIII,  p.  140;  XIV,  p.  153. 

^^ChapterXXIV,  p.  370. 

2"  Chapter  XXIV. 

25  Chapter  XIV,  pp.  147-148;  cf.  p.  158. 

26  Chapter  XIII,  p.  135. 
2''  Chapter  XII,  p.  132. 

28  Chapter  XIII,  pp.  138-139. 

29  Chapter  XIV,  p.  144. 

30  Chapter  XXII,  pp.  278-279. 

31  Chapter  XXVII,  p.  529. 

32  Chapter  XXVI. 

33  Chapter  XXIII. 

3"  Chapters  IV,  XVIII,  and  XXVI,  pp.  498-500- 

35  Chapter  XVII,  p.  203. 

36  Chapter  XIV,  p.  160. 

3^  Chapter  XXVII,  p.  520. 

38  Chapter  XXVI,  p.  472. 

39  Chapter  XIV,  p.  144- 

40  Chapter  XXVII,  p.  529. 
"1  Chapter  XXVII,  p.  511- 
^  Ibid. 

«  Chapters  XVII,  p.  204;  XX,  p.  244;  XXVI,  p.  488. 

'^  Chapter  XVII,  p.  204. 

^  Chapter  XXVII,  pp.  527,  524. 

«  Chapter  XVI,  p.  260. 

47  Chapter  XXVII,  pp.  51 1,  55 1- 

«  Chapter  XXVI,  p.  487- 


Notes  283 

«  Chapters  XIV,  p.  160;  XVI,  p.  196;  XVII,  pp.  201-203;  XVIII,  p.  205; 
XX,  pp.  243-244;  XXII,  pp.  266,  281 ;  XXVI,  p.  468. 

50  Chapter  XXVII,  pp.  531  ff. 

51  Chapter  XXV,  p.  419. 

52  Chapter  XXVII,  p.  533. 
«  Chapter  XXVII,  p.  534. 
5^  Chapter  XXV,  p.  445. 

56  Chapter  XXV,  p.  454- 
55  Chapter  XXV,  p.  445. 
5^  Chapter  XXVII,  p.  550. 

58  Chapters  XIV,  p.  160;  XXIII,  pp.  305,  345,  35S;  XXVII,  pp.  520,522,  544. 

59  Chapter  XXVI,  p.  482. 

«"  Chapter  XXV,  pp.  427-428. 
"  Chapter  XXVI,  p.  500. 

Chapter  XIV 

1  "The  World  and  the  Individual,"  by  Josiah  Royce,  New  York,  Volume  I, 
1900,  Volume  II,  1 901.  The  work  has  been  reprinted  a  number  of  times.  I 
take  Professor  Royce's  Idealism  as  it  is  set  forth  in  this  book ;  he  regards  it  as 
essentially  the  same  as  the  doctrine  presented  in  his  earlier  works,  beginning 
with  his  first  book,  published  in  1885  (see  the  Preface  to  Volume  II).  The  reader 
has  small  excuse  for  failing  to  grasp  Professor  Royce's  reasonings,  whether  he 
may  be  inclined  to  assent  to  them  or  not.  The  argument  is  presented  in  detail 
at  least  six  times  (Volume  I,  Lecture  I,  pp.  19-43;  Lecture  VII,  pp.  265-342; 
Lecture  VIII,  pp.  349-360;  Lecture  IX,  pp.  385-396;  Lecture  X,  pp.  433-460; 
\'olume  II,  Lecture  VI,  pp.  270-277).  Moreover,  the  briefer  returns  to  the 
argument,  or  to  single  aspects  of  it,  are  numberless. 

2  Volume  I,  Lecture  I,  p.  19. 
'  Ibid.,  pp.  22-23. 

4  Ibid.,  p.  25. 

5  Ibid.,  p.  26. 
^  Ibid.,  p.  27. 

^Ibid.,  pp.  27-31;  Lecture  VII,  pp.  271-272. 

8  Lecture  I,  pp.  26-42;  Lecture  VII,  pp.  335-342;  Lecture  X,  pp.  441-466; 
Volume  II,  Lecture  VI,  pp.  270  ff. 

"  See  the  detailed  discussion  in  Volume  I,  Lecture  VII,  pp.  300-343. 

"Ibid.,  p.  325. 

"  Ibid.,  p.  327. 

12  Ibid.,  p.  328. 

1'  Ibid.,  p.  329. 

"  Lecture  I,  pp.  39-40. 

15  Ibid.,  p.  38. 

i«  Ibid. 


284  The  World  We  Live  In 

"  Lecture  VII,  pp.  297-299. 

"  Ibid.,  p.  298. 

1^  Ibid.,  p.  298. 

'"'  Ibid.,  p.  297. 

21  Lecture  IX,  p.  386. 

"  Lecture  VII,  pp.  337-342  ;  Lecture  IX,  pp.  385-391 ;  Supplementary  Essay, 
pp.  571  ff. 

^  Lecture  VII,  pp.  329-330. 

"^  Volume  I,  Supplementary  Essay,  p.  581. 

25  Ibid.,  p.  545. 

^  Ibid.,  p.  501. 

'^  Volume  I,  Lecture  VI,  pp.  260-262. 

-^  Lecture  VII,  p.  341 ;  Supplementary  Essay,  p.  566. 

^'Supplementary  Essay,  p.  567. 

^°  Lecture  VII,  pp.  341-342. 

'1  Supplementary  Essay,  pp.  505-506. 

'-  Ibid.,  p.  511. 

^  Ibid.,  p.  533. 

^  Ibid. 

35  Ibid.,  pp.  526,  534. 

5^  Ibid.,  pp.  537-538. 

'^  Ibid.,  pp.  512-519;  Volume  II,  Lecture  X,  pp.  445-452. 

3^  ^'^olume  II,  Lecture  X,  p.  446. 

35  Ibid.,  pp.  451-452. 

^«  Ibid.,  p.  452- 

■"  Volume  I,  Supplementary  Essay,  pp.  502-507. 

^2  Volume  II,  Lecture  II,  p.  56. 

«Ibid.,  pp.  56-57- 

■"Ibid.,  p.  57. 

«  Ibid.,  p.  59. 

*^  Ibid.,  p.  62. 

^^Ibid.,  p.  63. 

*^  Volume  I,  Lecture  VII,  p.  281. 

"  Ibid.,  pp.  283,  290. 

E"  Ibid.,  p.  286. 

"  Ibid.,  p.  297. 

52  Ibid.,  p.  320. 

5-^  Ibid.,  pp.  324,  327. 

5^  This  doctrine  of  human  omniscience  and  invincible  inattention  is  not  a 
passing  thought,  taken  up  and  forgotten  again  by  the  author.  See  Volume 
II,  pp.  53-63  ;  also  pp.  149,  307- 

55  Volume  I,  Lecture  VII,  p.  334. 

5«  Supplementary  Essay,  pp.  494  fT. 

5'  There  is  adduced,  to  be  sure,  an  argument  to  prove  that  "  fragmentary " 


Notes  285 

being  cannot  be  the  WTioIe  of  Being ;  but,  as  it  appears  to  me  to  have  no  neces- 
sary connection  with  the  problem  of  the  infinite  spread  of  the  finite,  or  with  the 
self-representative  systems  that  interest  the  mathematician,  I  omit  a  dis- 
cussion of  it  here.  I  have  criticized  the  argument  elsewhere;  see  my  "System 
of  Metaphysics,"  pp.  585  ff.  In  "The  World  and  the  Individual"  the  argu- 
ment is  presented  in  Volume  I,  Lecture  VIII,  pp.  369-374. 

^^  Volume  I,  Lecture  IX,  p.  396. 

^'^  E.g.,  Berkeley,  "Principles,"  §  24;  Bradley,  "Appearance  and  Reality," 
Chapter  XIV,  p.  144;  Chapter  XXII,  pp.  278-279. 

Chapter  XV 

1  "The  World  and  the  Individual,"  Volume  II,  Lecture  IV,  pp.  164-165. 

2  Ibid.,  pp.  165-166. 
'  Ibid.,  pp.  170-171. 
^  Ibid.,  p.  172. 

^  Ibid.,  pp.  177-178. 

« Ibid.,  pp.  181-182. 

^  Ibid.,  pp.  186  ff.,  225. 

^  Ibid.,  p.  193. 

"  Ibid.,  p.  197;  Lecture  V,  pp.  207,  224. 

1"  Lecture  IV,  p.   202. 

"  Lecture  V,  p.  208. 

^^  Ibid.,  pp.  209-213. 

"  Lecture  IV,  p.  204. 

'''  Lecture  V,  p.  224. 

^^  Ibid.,  pp.  226-227. 

'^  Volume  I,  Lecture  IX,  p.  396. 

i^Ibid.,  p.  397. 

'^Volume  II,  Lecture  III,  pp.  113-115. 

"Ibid.,  p.  115. 

soibid.,  p.  116. 

-1  Ibid.,  pp.  116-117. 

^  Ibid.,  p.  113. 

^  Ibid.,  pp.  126-130. 

24  Ibid.,  pp.  i33-i3'5- 

2^  Ibid.,  pp.  138-147. 

2«  Ibid. 

''^Ibid.,  p.  147. 

2*  Lecture  X,  p.  445. 

2^  Lecture  VII,  p.  325. 

'"  Volume  I,  Lecture  X,  p.  464;  Volume  II,  Lecture  VII,  pp.  292-294. 

^'  Volume  I,  Lecture  X,  p.  467 ;  Volume  II,  Lecture  III,  p.  148. 

'2  Volume  I,  Lecture  X,  p.  468 ;  Volume  II,  Lecture  VII,  p.  293. 


286  The   World  We  Live  In 

^  Volume  II,  Lecture  VIII,  p.  374. 

^^  Volume  II,  Lecture  V,  p.  232. 

^  Ibid.,  p.  233.  The  expression  "time-span"  does  not  appear  to  me  to  be 
here  used  in  a  sense  identical  with  that  explained  earlier.  As  the  matter  does 
not  affect  the  argument  for  immortality,  I  pass  it  over. 

5«  Ibid. 

»■  Lecture  X,  pp.  435-436. 

^*  Ibid.,  p.  437. 

^"  Ibid.,  p.  440. 

"Ibid.,  p.  441. 

"  Ibid.,  pp.  441-442. 

«  Ibid.,  p.  442. 

«  Ibid. 

■"  Volume  I,  Lecture  VIII,  p.  380. 

^  Ibid.,  Lecture  X,  p.  470. 

••^  Volume  II,  Lecture  VIII,  p.  374. 

^^  Ibid.,  Lecture  II,  p.  102  ;  Lecture  VII,  p.  298. 

''^  Ibid.,  Lecture  VII,  p.  327  ;  Lecture  III,  p.  148. 

"  Ibid.,  Lecture  VIII,  p.  374. 

'0  Ibid. 

'^  Ibid.,  Lecture  IV,  pp.  197-204 ;  Lecture  V,  pp.  207,  214-219,  and  pp.  224  ff. 

^2  "Now  as  a  finite  being,  confined  to  this  instant,  you  do  not  experience  my 
experience,  nor  in  the  same  finite  sense  do  I  now  and  here  experience  your 
experience.  .  .  .  Whoever  asserts,  then,  that  human  experience  exists,  as  a  body 
consisting  of  the  many  experiences  of  various  human  observers,  asserts  what  no 
finite  human  observer  ever  has,  at  any  moment,  experienced.  For  I  insist,  no 
man  ever  yet  at  any  instant  himself  observed  that  mankind  as  a  body,  or  that 
any  man  but  himself,  was  observing  facts."  Volume  I,  Lecture  VIII,  pp.  363- 
364.  Compare:  Volume  II,  Lecture  IV,  pp.  168-180;  Lecture  V,  pp.  228- 
229;  Lecture  VI,  pp.  256-258,  260-265. 

Chapter  XVI 

1  "Pragmatism,"  pp.  66-67,  233-234.  How  far  the  dialogue  reported  in  this 
chapter  does  justice  to  the  philosophies  of  Christian  and  Faithful,  I  am  willing 
to  leave  to  the  judgment  of  the  attentive  reader  of  "  Pragmatism,"  by  William 
James,  London,  1907,  and  "Studies  in  Humanism,"  by  F.  C.  S.  Schiller,  London, 
1907.  Naturally,  no  one  has  a  right  to  make  either  of  these  writers  directly 
responsible  for  anything  that  he  has  not  actually  said  in  so  many  words.  A 
very  large  number  of  things  thus  said  have,  howe\er,  been  incorporated  into  the 
conversation,  and  references  have  been  given.  That  they  are  citations  has,  in 
most  instances,  not  been  indicated,  to  avoid  disfiguring  the  text  and  annoying 
the  reader  who  may  be  willing  to  take  my  words  on  trust.  Why  I  have  not 
thought  it  worth  while  to  quote  from  or  refer  to  later  controversial  articles  is 


Notes  287 

made  clear  in  the  latter  part  of  the  chapter.  It  is  also  made  clear  that  I  my- 
self regard  it  as  an  injustice  to  hold  the  writers  in  question  literally  responsible 
even  for  the  quotations  from  their  works.  In  William  James's  latest  volume, 
"Some  Problems  of  Philosophy"  (London,  1911),  I  find  much  that  is  in- 
teresting and  stimulating,  but  nothing  that  leads  me  to  modify  my  sketch  of 
his  pragmatism.  Nor  have  I  thought  it  worth  while  to  quote  from  Dr.  Schil- 
ler's "Formal  Logic"  (London,  1912).  This  interesting  work  is  largely  a 
polemic.  It  does  not,  I  think,  bring  forward  any  new  arguments  for  Human- 
ism, nor  does  the  author  in  it  retract  any  statements  that  he  has  made  before. 

2  "Pragmatism,"  p.  54. 

^  Ibid.,  p.  259. 

^  Ibid.,  p.  260. 

^Ibid.,  p.  215. 

*  Ibid.,  p.  79. 
^Ibid.,  p.  257. 

*  Ibid.,  p.  161. 
9  Ibid.,  p.  166. 
i^Ibid.,  p.  259. 

"  Ibid.,  pp.  256-257. 

^  Ibid.,  p.  259. 

^^  Ibid. 

"  Ibid.,  pp.  134-138- 

^5  Ibid.,  p.   161. 

16  Ibid.,  p.  166. 

1^  Ibid.,  pp.  256-257. 

18  Ibid.,  pp.  239-243. 

1^  Ibid.,  pp.  261-264. 

2"  Ibid.,  p.  257. 

-1  Ibid.,  pp.  222-223. 

^  Ibid.,  p.  216. 

■^  Ibid. 

2*  Ibid.,  p.  161. 

^Ibid.,  pp.  222-223. 

^  Ibid.,  pp.  260-261. 

-''Ibid.,  pp.  8,  218,  224,  256-259. 

2^  Ibid.,  pp.  79-80. 

2^  Ibid.,  pp.  79,  118-119. 

^^  Ibid.,  pp.  59-64. 

'1  Ibid.,  pp.  222-223. 

»2  Ibid.,  p.  54. 

33  Ibid.,  pp.  252-257. 

34  Ibid.,  pp.  258-259. 
3*  Ibid.,  pp.  218,  224. 
3*  Ibid.,  p.  79. 


288  The   World  We  Live  In 

"  Ibid.,  pp.  56-57. 

'8  Ibid.,  pp.  73-75. 

''  Ibid.,  p.  242. 

"  Ibid.,  p.  204. 

^  Ibid.,  pp.  59-61. 

^  Ibid.,  p.  244. 

«Ibid.,  p.  186. 

"  Ibid.,  p.  244. 

^  Ibid.,  p.  205. 

^^Ibid.,  p.  245. 

^"  Ibid.,  p.  211. 

^^  Ibid.,  p.  215. 

^^  Ibid.,  p.  213. 

^^  Ibid.,  pp.  222-223. 

"  Ibid.,  p.  216. 

*''Ibid.,  p.  245. 

« Ibid.,  p.  233. 

"  Ibid. 

«Ibid.,  pp.  251-253. 

^  Ibid.,  p.  255. 

^^  "Studies  in  Humanism,"  XIX,  p.  444. 

^'  "Humanism,"  by  F.  C.  S.  Schiller,  London,  1903,  II,  p.  31. 

"  "Studies  in  Humanism,"  VII,  p.  186. 

^nbid.,  pp.  186-187. 

"  Ibid.,  p.  187. 

62  Ibid. 

« Ibid. 

« Ibid.,  p.  188. 

65  Ibid.,  XIX,  p.  430. 

^  Ibid.,  p.  432. 

6' Ibid.,  p.  433. 

6"  Ibid.,  p.  444. 

«» Ibid.,  p.  445. 

^»Ibid.,  VII,  p.  190. 

"Ibid.,  I,  p.  II. 

'2  Ibid.,  XIX,  p.  445- 

"  Ibid.,  V,  p.  143- 

"  Ibid.,  I,  p.  s. 

« Ibid.,  p.  6. 

'«Ibid.,  V,  p.  151. 

"  Ibid.,  p.  152. 

"  Ibid.,  p.  154. 

7«  Ibid.,  p.  155. 

""  Ibid.,  p.  156. 


Notes  289 


«ilbid,  I,  p.  5. 

82  Ibid.,  p.  6. 

s'  Ibid.,  VII,  p.  182. 

»<Ibid.,p.  183. 

8*  Ibid.,  I,  p.  6. 

« Ibid. 

*'  "Pragmatism,"  pp.  245-255. 

«8  "Studies  in  Humanism,"  VII,  p.  i{ 

89  Ibid.,  p.  189. 

90  Ibid. 

91  Ibid. 

92  "Pragmatism,"  p.  225. 

"  "Studies  in  Humanism,"  I,  p.  6. 

94  Ibid.,  VIII,  p.  195. 

96  Ibid.,  XIX,  p.  432. 

9«  Ibid.,  VII,  p.  198. 

9' Ibid.,  I,  p.  II. 

98  "  Pragmatism,"  p.  257. 


Chapter  XVII 

1  See  the  sympathetic  account  of  Mysticism  in  Royce's  "  The  World  and  the 
Individual,"  Volume  I,  Lecture  IV. 


u 


INDEX 


Absolute,  Dr.  Bradley  and  the,  191-104 ; 
Professor  Royce  on  the.  Chapters  XIV, 
XV;  implied  in  every  idea,  202  2. 

Agrippa,  23. 

Albee,  E.,  276. 

Anaxagoras,  20. 

Annihilation,  and  disappearance,  48. 

Appearances,  and  things,  16-31;  see 
Idealism;  Kantian  treatment  of.  Chap- 
ter VI;  reality  of.  Chapter  VII; 
the  word  misconceived,  97 ;  signifi- 
cance of  sense-organs,  102-108;  the 
New  Realism  and.  Chapter  IX;  the 
Mind-stuff  doctrine  and,  168  ff. ;  Dr. 
Bradley  and,  187  ff.;  Pragmatism  and. 
Chapter  XVI. 

Aristippus,  21,  23. 

Aristotle,  21,  22,  54,  89. 

Aspects,  of  the  world,  Chapter  VIII. 

Atomists,  20. 

Atoms,  see  Science. 

Augustine,  24,  25. 

Bacon,  Francis,  9. 

Bakewell,  C.  M.,  276. 

Being,  the  Parmenidean,  18,  33  ;  conceived 

as  the  Limit,  203. 
Berkeley,  32  ff. ;  his  doctrine,  Chapters  III, 

IV ;  Kant's  relation  to,  Chapters  V,  V'l ; 

Chapter  XI,   164;    the  New  Idealism 

and.  186  ff. 
Bosanquet,  B.,  276. 
Bradley,    F.    H.,    his    doctrine,    Chapter 

XIII;  references  to,  281-283. 

Christian,  229  ff. 

Clifford,  VV.  K.,  171  ff.,  181-182. 

Common  Sense,  and  science,  10;  Berkeley 
and,  39  ;  Kant  and,  68  ;  the  New  Real- 
ism and,  Chapter  XI ;  the  New  Ideal- 
ism and,  225-226. 

Continuous  E.xistence,  of  things,  6  ;  Berke- 
ley and,  48;  in  the  New  Realism,  121 
£f. ;  Dr.  Bradley  on,  185  ff. ;  Professor 
Royce  on,  216. 

Corpuscles,  see  Science. 

Creighton,  J.  E.,  276. 


Darwin,  C,  105,  106,  261. 
Death,  Professor  Royce  on,  221,  223-225. 
Dedekind,  206. 
Democritus,  54. 
Descartes,  26,  66,  84,  135. 
Duplicate     World,     doctrine    of,     26-28; 
Kant's  position,  73-74. 

Eject,  doctrine  of,  171. 

Empedocles,  20,  54. 

Epicurus,  2  3. 

Eternal,  argument  for  eternal  knowledge, 
217  ff.;  the  temporal  and  eternal 
orders,  219-220;  what  eternal  knowl- 
edge implies,  224. 

Everybody's  World,  itsgeneral  features,  i- 
15;  its  problem,  16-31;  Idealism  and, 
39  ff.,  and  Chapter  IV;  the  World  as 
Phenomenon  and,  Chapter  VII;  its 
many  aspects.  Chapter  VIII;  what  is 
taken  for  granted  in,  1 19  ff. ;  secondary 
qualities  of  bodies  in,  131  ff. ;  itsgeneral 
features  reexamined,  ChapterXI;  Mind- 
stuff  and,  174;  discredited  by  Dr. 
Bradley,  191  ff. ;  by  Professor  Royce, 
225-226;  the  philosopher  and,  257  ff. 

Existence,  Berkeleyan  sense  of,  see  Berke- 
ley; meaning  of,  121  ff.;  Professor 
Royce's  conception,  216  ff. 

External,  meaning  of  word,  114  ff. ;  ex- 
ternal world  immediately  experienced, 
Chapter  IX ;  secondary  qualities  of 
bodies  external.  Chapter  X;  external 
meanings,  Chapter  XIV. 

Fact,    pragmatic   view   of,    241-242,    244- 

245  ;   facts  not  true,  246. 
Faithful,  229  ff. 
Foreknowledge,  God's,  224. 
Freedom,  man's,  220,  223. 

God,  Berkeley's  argument,  41,  51-53;  the 
World  as,  127;  pan  psych  ism  and,  182; 
Dr.  Bradley  on,  184,  193;  Professor 
Royce  on.  Chapters  XIV,  XV ;  implied 
in  every  idea,  202  ff. ;  unity  of  life  and 
meaning,  217;  God's  will,  220. 

Gorgias,  21. 


291 


292 


Index 


Hamilton,  Sir  W.,  55. 
Hobhouse,  L.  T.,  280. 
Holt,  E.  B.,  p.  viii. 
Humanism,  241  fif. 
Hume,  D.,  61,  68,  72. 

Idea,  see  Idealism ;  the  Platonic,  i2> ; 
Locke's  definition,  34 ;  the  World  as, 
127  ;  internal  and  external  meanings  of, 
200  flf. 

Idealism,  the  Berkeleyan,  Chapters  III, 
IV;  the  Kantian,  Chapter  V;  Plato's, 
33;  New  Idealism,  43,  59;  formal, 
critical,  dogmatic,  and  skeptical,  66; 
Kant's  refutation  of,  80  ff. ;  Mind-stuS 
doctrine  and.  182;  New  Idealism, 
Chapters  XIII,  XIV,  XV. 

Immediacy,  of  our  knowledge  of  external 
things.  Chapter  IX;  Chapter  XI,  p. 
iS6ff. 

Immortality,  Berkeley  on,  42 ;  Professor 
Royce  on,  220,  223-225. 

Independence,  of  things,  Berkeley,  48; 
the  New  Realist  on.  Chapter  IX;  sec- 
ondary qualities  of  bodies  and,  131  ff. ; 
Dr.  Bradley  on,  185  ff. ;  Professor 
Royce  on,  216. 

Infinite,  how  attained,  204  ff. 

Internal,  meaning  of  the  word,  114  ff. ; 
secondary  qualities  of  bodies,  Chapter 
X;  internal  meanings.  Chapter  XIV. 

James,  W.,  his  pragmatism.  Chapter  XVI; 
will  to  believe,  262 ;  references  to  works 
of,  286-289. 

Kant,  30 ;  as  idealist.  Chapter  V ;  his 
phenomenalism,  Chapter  VI ;  defense 
of  his  phenomenalism,  Chapter  \'II; 
on  aspects  of  the  world.  Chapter  VIII ; 
the  New  Realism  and,  127-128. 

Kemp-Smith,  N.,  p.  viii. 

Keyserling,  H.  von,  280. 

Kiilpe,  O.,  p.  viii. 

Locke,  26,  34,  54,  130,  132. 

Lodge,  Sir  O.,  143. 

Logical    Theory,    Pragmatism    as,    248- 

251- 
Lucretius,  115. 

McGilvary,  E.  B.,  p.  viii. 
Mach,  E.,  58. 

Map,  illustration  of  the,  205-212. 
Marvin,  W.  T.,  p.  viii. 


Materialism,  Dr.  Bradley  on,  184-185. 
Mathematicians,  the  infinite  and  the,  204 

ff.,  212  ff. 
Meanings,  internal  and  external.  Chapter 

XIV. 
Medieval  Philosophy,  24. 
Mental    and    Physical,    the    contrast    of, 

114  ff. 
Mill,  J.  S.,  54,  95,  123. 
Miller,  Dickinson  S.,  p.  viii,  275. 
Minds,    common    sense    treatment   of,    7 ; 

New  Realist's  treatment  of,  153  ff. 
Mind-stuff,  167  ff. 
Monism,  99. 
Montague,  W.  P.,  p.  viii. 
Moore,  G.  E.,  p.  viii. 

Nature,    Professor     Royce's     conception, 

215  ff. 
New   Idealism,    43,    59;     Chapters   XIII, 

XIV,  XV. 
Noumenon,  75  ff. ;   see  Thing-in-itself. 

Objective  Order,  see  Orders. 
Occam,  24. 

Omniscience,  man's,  207-208. 
Orders,  of  phenomena,  86,  11 2-1 27. 

Panpsychism,  see  Mind-stuff. 

Papini,  234. 

Parmenides,  18,  33,  65. 

Part,  equal  to  whole,  207. 

Pearson,  K.,  58. 

Perception,  not  the  measure  of  existence, 
78  ff. 

Perry,  R.  B.,  p.  viii. 

Phenomenon,  the  World  as,  Chapters  VI, 
VII ;  the  word  misunderstood,  97 ; 
aspects  of  the  phenomenal  world.  Chap- 
ter VIII ;  the  New  Realism  and  phe- 
nomena. Chapter  IX. 

Philosopher,  the  varieties  of,  13 ;  not  a 
colorless  reason,  264 ;  his  religious 
character,  265-266. 

Physical  things,  common  sense  and,  5  ff. ; 
function  of  the  physical  in  ordering 
phenomena,  88  ff. ;  contrast  of  physical 
and  mental,  114  ff.;  Professor  Royce's 
conception  of,  216-217. 

Pierre  d'Ailly,  24. 

Pitkin,  W.  B.,  p.  viii. 

Plato,  21,  33,  54- 

Pluralism,  7,  99. 

Possibilities,  of  perception,  see  Mill;  of 
existence,  123. 


Index 


293 


Pragmatism,  Chapter  XVI;  classes  of 
pragmatists,  249;  startling  character 
of,  257. 

Prophecy,  Pragmatism  as,  247  £f. 

Protagoras,  21,  23. 

Pyrrho,  23. 

Qualities,  primary  and  secondary,  Chapter 
X. 

Realism,  the  New,  Chapter  IX;  its  treat- 
ment of  primary  and  secondary  quali- 
ties of  bodies,  Chapter  X;  Kant  and 
the  New  Realism,  126-128;  the  Thin:;- 
in  itself  and,  130;  the  Unknowable 
and,  130;  atoms  and  corpuscles  and, 
142-147;  common  sense  and.  Chapter 
XI. 

Reality,  as  mind-stufT,  168  ff. ;  as  will, 
178-182;  Dr.  Bradley's  account  of, 
igi-iQ4;   Professor  Royce  on,  202  ff. 

Reason,  the  World  as,  127. 

Religion,  Dr.  Bradley's  conception,  193 ; 
the  philosopher's  attitude  towards, 
268  ff. 

Royce,  J.,  his  doctrine.  Chapters  XIV, 
XV  ;   references,  283-2S6,  289. 

Russell,  B.,  p.  viii. 

Schiller,  F.  C.  S.,  his  Humanism,  Chapter 
XVI;  references,  286-289. 

Schoolmen,  54. 

Science,  and  common  sense,  10,  92  ff.;  and 
the  secondary  qualities  of  bodies,  133- 
134;  on  atoms  and  corpuscles,  141  ff. ; 
the  pragmatist  and,  243. 

Secondary  qualities.  Chapter  X. 

Sensation,  see  Idea;  significance  of  sense- 
organs,  102-108,  109  ff. 


Skepticism,  criticism  of,  253-254. 

Skeptics,  22,  54. 

Spaulding,  E.  G.,  p.  viii. 

Spencer,  H.,  29. 

Stoics,  22. 

Stout,  G.  F.,  p.  viii. 

Strong,  C.  A.,  his  panpsychism.    Chapter 

XII. 
Subjective,    phenomena    distinguished    as 

objective  and,  86  ;   see  Orders. 
Substance,  154  ff. 
Superstition,  269-270. 

Theology,  Dr.  Bradley  on,  184. 

Thing-in-itself,  30,  82. 

Things,  appearances  and,  16-31 ;  the  in- 
dependence of,  Berkeley,  48;  immedi- 
ately perceived,  Kant,  82  ff. ;  New 
Realist's  treatment  of,  Chapter  IX. 

Time-span,  21S  ff. 

Truth,  pragmatic  conception  of,  232-246; 
ultimate,  259. 

Ultimate    Truth,    svperstitlon    regarding, 

259- 
Universe,  as  understood  by  Dr.  Bradley, 
igi-194 ;   implied  in  every  idea,  202  ff. ; 
the  pragmatic,  233  ff. 

Unknowable,  29,  73,  154,  254-255. 

Will,  the  world  as,  178-182;  time  and 
God's  will,  220;  will  to  believe,  262  ff. 

Woodbridge,  F.  J.  E.,  p.  viii. 

Woodcutter,  illustration  of,  109,  137. 

World,  its  many  aspects,  Chapter  VIII. 

Wundt,  W.,  and  the  World  as  Will,  Chap- 
ter XII. 

Zeno,  1 8,  19. 


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A  System  of  Metaphysics 

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The  subject  matter  of  this  book  is  divided  into  four  parts  :  The  Content  of 
Consciousness;  The  External  World;  Mind  and  Matter;  Other  Minds, 
and  The  Realm  of  Minds.  The  divisions  under  Part  I  are:  The  Mind 
and  the  World  in  Common  Thought  and  in  Science;  The  Inadequacy  of 
the  Psychological  Standpoint;  How  Things  are  given  in  Consciousness; 
The  Elements  in  Consciousness;  The  Self  or  Knower.  Under  Part  II: 
What  we  Mean  by  the  External  World;  Sensations  and  "Things";  The 
Distinction  between  Appearance  and  Reality  ;  Significance  of  the  Distinc- 
tion between  Appearance  and  Reality;  The  Kantian  Doctrine  of  Space; 
Difficulties  connected  with  It;  The  Berkeleian  Doctrine  of  Space,  of 
Time;  The  Real  World  in  Space  and  Time;  The  V/orld  as  Mechanism. 
Under  Part  III  :  The  Insufficiency  of  Materialism  ;  The  Atomic  Self;  The 
Automaton  Theory,  Its  Genesis;  The  Automaton  Theory,  Parallelism; 
What  is  Parallelism?;  The  Man  and  the  Candlestick;  The  Metaphysics 
of  the  "Telephone  Exchange";  The  Distinction  between  the  World 
and  the  Mind;  The  Time  and  Place  of  Sensations  and  Ideas;  Of  Natu- 
ral Realism,  Hypothetical  Realism,  Idealism  and  Materialism;  The 
World  as  Unperceived  and  the  "  Unknowable."  Under  Part  IV :  The 
Existence  of  Other  Minds;  The  Distribution  of  Minds;  The  Unity  of 
Consciousness;  Subconscious  Mind;  Mental  Phenomena  and  the  Causal 
Nexus  ;  Mechanism  and  Teleology ;  Fatalism,  Free-will,  and  Determinism 
of  God. 


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A  Student's  History  of  Philosophy.  By  Arthur  Kenyon  Rogers,  Pro- 
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translation  by  James  H.  Tufts,  Ph.D.,  Professor  of  Philosophy  in  the  Uni- 
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Introduction  to  Philosophy.  By  William  Jerusalem,  Lecturer  in  Philoso- 
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A  Brief  Introduction  to  Modern  Philosophy.  By  Arthur  Kenyon  Rogers 
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Outlines  of  Metaphysics.  By  John  S.  Mackenzie,  M.A.,  Glasgow ;  Litt.D., 
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A  System  of  Metaphysics.  By  George  Stewart  Fullerton,  Professor 
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Elements  of  Metaphysics.  By  A.  E.  Taylor,  Professor  of  Philosophy  in 
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Concepts  of  Philosophy.  In  Three  Parts.  Part  I,  Analysis.  Part  II,  Syn- 
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The  Problems  of  Philosophy.  By  Harald  Hoffding.  Translated  by 
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Studies  in  Humanism.  By  F.  C.  S.  Schiller,  M.A.,  D.Sc  Published  in 
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The  Critical  Philosophy  of  Immanuel  Kant.    By  Edward  Cairo,  LL.D, 

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The  Philosophy  of  Kant  Explained.  By  John  Watson,  M.A.,  LL.D.,  Pro- 
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The  Philosophy  of  Kant.  As  contained  in  Extracts  from  His  Own  Writings. 
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The  World  and  the  Individual.  Gifford  Lectures  delivered  at  University  of 
Aberdeen.  By  JOSIAH  ROYCE,  Ph.D.,  Professor  of  the  History  of  Philos- 
ophy in  Harvard  University. 

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The  World  a  Spiritual  System.  An  Outline  of  Metaphysics.  By  jAMES  H. 
SNOWDEN.    Published  in  New  York,  1910.     Cloth,  jj6 pp.,  121110,  $1.^0  net 

Modern  Thought  and  the  Crisis  in  Belief.  By  R.  M.  Wenley.  of  the  Uni- 
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The  Religious  Conception  of  the  World.  An  Essay  in  Constructive  Philos- 
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